itwmtg 


.No 

Division 
Range 

Shelf 

Received 


University  of  California. 


CMKT    OK 


OO, 


CHAPTERS 


SOCIAL  SCIENCE 


AS    CONNECTED    WITH 


THE    ADMINISTRATION 


OF 


STATE  CHARITIES. 


GEORGE  L.  HARRISON. 


IE1  IR,  I  2ST  T  E  ID 


PHILADELPHIA  : 
I877. 


Entered,  according  to  act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1877,  by 

GEORGE   L.   HARRISON, 
In  the  office  of  the  Librarian  of  Congress,  at  Washington,  D.  C. 


Printed  by 

ALLEN,  LANE  &  SCOTT, 

No.  233  South  Fifth  Street, 

Philadelphia. 


I  UNIVERSITY  OF 

I   CALIFORNIA. 

^\^-_  __ ,  _ 


PREFACE. 


THE  following  pages  aYe  selected  from  papers  originally  con 
tributed  to  the  annual  reports  of  the  Board  of  Public  Charities 
of  the  State  of  Pennsylvania  by  the  president  of  the  Board. 
They  appeared  in  those  reports  as  published  by  order  of  the 
legislature  in  the  years  1870  to  1874,  inclusive.  The  writer  has 
deemed  it  advisable  to  collect  them  into  one  volume  for  his 
own  gratification  and  that  of  his  friends,  venturing  to  think  that 
thus  they  may  not  be  without  some  further  utility. 

It  might  have  seemed  desirable  to  recast  and  rewrite  the  whole, 
digesting  what  pertains  to  each  of  the  subjects  discussed  into  one 
consistent  and  continuous  treatise  adjusted  to  the  present  time. 
But  this  would  have  cost  much  labor,  and  would  have  been,  in  fact, 
the  production  of  an  entirely  new  work,  and,  especially,  would 
have  defeated  a  leading  design  of  the  writer  in  having  this  volume 
printed, — which  was,  to  keep  the  whole  in  its  original  association 
with  the  past.  It  has  been  thought  best,  therefore,  to  leave  the 
several  chapters  in  their  historical  character,  each  with  its  proper 
date,  appending  such  notes  and  explanations  as  may  seem  required 
by  the  state  of  the  several  questions  at  the  present  time. 

The  original  form,  therefore,  remains,  as  addressed  to  the  legis 
lature  under  the  circumstances  then  existing.  There  have  been 
some  slight  omissions,  but  no  additions  in  the  text,  and  no  modifi 
cations  either  in  the  sentiments  or  the  expression,  of  sufficient 
importance  to  be  mentioned. 

The  whole  is  dedicated  to  my  family  and  friends  and  those  who 
come  after  me,  as  a  memorial  of  labors  which  have  been  for  many 
years  among  the  most  cherished  and  most  absorbing  objects  of 
my  life. 

The  volume  does  not  seek  the  public  eye,  but,  while  it  does  not 
challenge,  it  does  not  shun  either  perusal  or  criticism. 

May,  1877.  G.  L.  H. 

(iii) 


CONTENTS. 


EDUCATION. 

PAGE 

1.  Compulsory  Education  (1871), i 

2.  Schools  of  Reform  (1873),  •    • 37 

3.  Reformation    of   Neglected,    Destitute,    and    Vicious 

Children  (1874), 76 

PRISON  ECONOMY. 

1.  Prison  Discipline  (1871), 89 

2.  Benevolence  in  Punishment  and  in  Provision  for  the 

Poor  (1871), 100 

3.  Crime  and  Prison  Economy  (1872), 105 

4.  Prison  Reform  (1874), 224 

CARE  OF  THE  INSANE. 

1.  Insane  Hospitals  (1872), 243 

2.  Plea  for  the  Insane  (1873), 26i 

3.  Addendum  to  Plea  (1873), 3&1 

4.  Provision  for  the  Insane  Poor  (1874), 396 

5.  Concluding  chapter  (1870-1877), 433 


(v) 


LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF 

CALIFORNIA. 


EDUCATION. 


COMPULSORY   EDUCATION. 

IN  the  report  of  this  board  for  1870,  the  last  topic 
presented  was  that  of  neglected  children.  The  legis 
lature  was  then  appealed  to,  by  the  highest  considera 
tions  of  the  interests  and  duty  of  the  State,  to  make 
provision  for  their  care  and  education.  "  The  average 
of  social  virtue,  dignity,  and  wealth,"  it  was  then  said, 
"  is  much  reduced  by  the  presence  of  this  debased  and 
debasing  ingredient.  And  it  is  a  problem  well  worthy 
of  the  gravest  and  most  patient  thought  of  philan 
thropic  political  economists,  whether  anything,  and  (if 
anything)  what  can  be  done  for  the  rescue  of  these  un 
fortunates  from  their  ill-starred  condition,  for  the 
protection  of  the  community  which  they  deteriorate, 
and  for  the  purity,  welfare,  and  honor  of  the  State,  the 
mother  of  them  all." 

This  evil  exists  in  all  parts  of  the  country,  but  is  most 
patent  and  pressing  in  large  cities  and  crowded  com 
munities.  The  remedy — what  it  shall  be,  and  how  it 
shall  be  applied — is  a  subject  beset  with  grave  diffi 
culties  ;  but  they  are  difficulties  which  must  be  sooner 
or  later  manfully  met  and  grappled  with.  The  stability 
and  welfare  of  the  State  and  its  free  institutions,  the 


2  EDUCATION. 

interests  and  safety  of  every  citizen,  and  the  weal  or 
woe  of  the  thousands  of  innocent  and  helpless  victims, 
are  involved  in  the  question  and  wait  upon  your 
solution. 

This  is  an  eminently  proper  subject  for  this  board 
to  bring  to  your  attention,  both  as  a  "  Board  of  Public 
Charities,"  and  as  being  required  by  law  to  report  on 
the  causes  and  remedies  of  vice  and  crime. 

No  almshouse,  no  hospital,  no  asylum  or  refuge  for 
the  poor,  the  diseased,  the  insane,  the  imbecile,  the  in 
ebriate,  or  the  juvenile  offender,  is  more  a  work  of 
charity,  than  would  be  a  provision  for  the  care  and 
education  of  these  neglected  children.  No  courts  of 
justice,  no  prisons  or  penitentiaries,  or  houses  of  cor 
rection,  or  reformatory  schools,  can  tend  more  directly 
or  powerfully  to  the  diminution  of  vice  and  crime,  than 
schools  and  homes  for  these  poor  unfortunates,  ever 
growing  up  in  ignorance  and  pernicious  habits,  pre 
paring  to  leaven  our  whole  social  condition,  and  to 
assist  in  making  our  laws. 

According  to  the  census  of  1860  (the  data  of  that 
for  1870  are  not  accessible),  the  number  of  adults  who 
could  not  read  was  :— 

In  the  United  States,  of  the  whole  adult  population,  20  per  cent. 

of  the  white  adult  population,  9       " 
"              "               of  the  native  white  adult  popu 
lation,  7J/2    '' 

In  New  York,  of  the  whole  adult  population,    ....  6       " 

"             of  the  native  white  adult  population,  .    .  \y2   " 

In  Massachusetts,  of  the  whole  adult  population,  .    .    .  7        " 

of  the  native  white  adult  population,  ^   " 

In  Maine,  of  the  whole  adult  population, 3       k' 

"         of  the  native  white  adult  population,  ...  ^   " 


EDUCATION.  3 

In  Pennsylvania,  of  the  whole  adult  population,       .    .    6  per  cent. 
"  of  the  native  white  adult  population,     3^    " 

It  is  to  be  observed  that  only  the  number  of  the 
adult  population  is  here  referred  to  in  each  case. 

Of  the  native  white  population  (adult)  the  number 
of  illiterate  adults,  less  their  proportion  of  adults  who 
were  idiotic,  insane,  deaf-mutes,  and  blind,  was  :— 

In  Massachusetts, — 230 

In  Maine, J^S0? 

In  Pennsylvania, .• 34,47° 

Thus  the  number  in  Pennsylvania  was  five  to  one 
of  that  in  Maine,  in  proportion  to  the  native  white 
population  of  the  respective  States  ;  while  in  Massa 
chusetts,  the  result  shows,  if  the  returns  are  correct, 
that  more  than  two  hundred  and  thirty  of  the  idiotic, 
insane,  deaf-mute,  and  blind  adults  must  have  been 
taught  to  read,  which  is  undoubtedly  the  fact.  Since 
1860,  great  improvements  have  been  made  in  the  con 
stitution  and  working  of  the  school  system  in  Pennsyl 
vania,  and  it  is  to  be  presumed  that  the  proportion  of 
illiteracy  among  her  native  white  population  has  greatly 
diminished.  Under  such  circumstances,  the  much 
greater  proportion  of  illiteracy  among  the  foreign- 
born  population,  though  a  great,  is  but  a  temporary, 
evil. 

In  reckoning  the  twenty  per  cent,  of  illiteracy  in 
1860,  in  the  whole  adult  population  of  the  United 
States,  it  is  to  be  observed  that  the  slaves  were  set 
down,  according  to  their  legal  status,  as  all  untaught 
to  read,  which  was  then  not  far  from  the  fact. 


4  EDUCATION. 

NON-ATTENDANCE    OF    CHILDREN    AT    SCHOOL. 

The  number  of  children  of  the  school  age  (from 
five  to  fifteen),  not  attending  the  public  schools  at  all, 
was  : — 

In  Massachusetts,  in  1869  and  1870, 9  per  cent. 

"  average  absence  of  pupils.  ....  19  " 

In  Pennsylvania,  in  1869  and  1870, 6  " 

average  absence  of  pupils,  .  .  .  .  33  " 

In  Philadelphia,  in  1869  and  1870, 12  " 

"  average  absence  of  pupils,  ....  46  " 

In  New  York  (school  age  five  to  twenty-one),  in  1869,  24  " 

The  number  of  pupils  in  academies  and  private 
schools,  in  Massachusetts  and  Pennsylvania,  may  about 
balance  the  number  in  the  public  schools,  of  pupils 
under  five  and  over  fifteen  years  of  age. 

If,  then,  we  make  due  allowance  for  the  number  of 
imbecile,  insane,  deaf-mute,  and  blind,  for  those  taught 
to  read  at  home,  for  those  detained  from  school  by 
chronic  sickness,  for  those  (particularly  between  the 
ages  of  five  and  eight)  not  yet  sent  to  school,  but  who 
will  attend  hereafter,  and  for  those  (particularly  between 
the  ages  of  twelve  and  fifteen)  not  attending  school  in 
the  given  year,  but  who  had  already  learned  to  read  in 
former  years,  the  percentage  of  absolute  non-attend 
ance  in  these  two  States  will  be  reduced  to  a  very  low 
figure,  probably  to  not  more  than  one  or  two  per  cent., 
which  is  quite  enough.  And  the  apparent  advantage 
of  Pennsylvania  over  Massachusetts,  in  the  percentage, 
may,  it  is  not  unlikely,  arise  from  some  difference  in 
the  manner  of  making  the  returns. 


EDUCATION.  5 

In  Pennsylvania,  the  whole  number  of  pupils  regis 
tered  in  the  public  schools,  during  the  whole  year,  are 
reported.  In  Massachusetts,  the  highest  number  at 
tending  for  any  time,  that  is,  in  the  winter  schools,  is 
given.  In  other  words,  in  Massachusetts  the  highest 
number  attending  the  summer  schools  is  returned,  and 
the  highest  number  attending-  the  winter  schools  ;  but 

o  o 

though  many  pupils  attend  in  summer  and  not  in 
winter,  and  conversely,  no  attempt  is  made  to  give  the 
full  number  of  different  names  registered  at  both  sea 
sons  of  the  year.  However  this  point  of  comparison 
may  be  settled,  any  doubtful  advantage  in  this  respect 
is  more  than  balanced  by  our  manifest  disadvantage 

*  o 

in  the  average  absenteeism  of  those  actually  regis 
tered  as  pupils. 

If  due  allowance  is  made  for  the  longer  period  of 
school  age  in  New  York,  it  will  probably  be  found  that, 
at  least  outside  of  the  city  of  New  York,  the  school 
system  of  that  State  is  quite  as  effective  in  reaching 
the  whole  population  as  that  of  either  Massachusetts 
or  Pennsylvania. 

It  is  in  the  large  cities,  as  is  shown  by  the  statistics 
of  Philadelphia,  Pittsburg,  Reading,  and  other  large 
cities,  that  the  greatest  proportion  of  neglected  and 
uninstructed  children  is  found  ;  and  in  such  communi 
ties  the  proportion  is  appalling.  It  cannot  be  less  in 
Philadelphia,  after  all  such  allowances  as  those  before 
referred  to  are  made,  than  about  six  per  cent,  of  the 
whole  number  of  children  of  the  school  age — that  is 
to  say,  about  ten  or  eleven  thousand.  And  the  huge 
and  unparalleled  proportion  of  absence  to  attendance 
of  the  pupils  themselves,  viz.,  forty-six  to  fifty-four,  is 
scarcely  less  appalling. 


6  EDUCATION. 

IGNORANCE  AND  CRIME. 

Ignorance  not  only  entails  vice  and  wretchedness 
upon  the  individual,  and  loss  and  expense  upon  the 
State,  but  it  is  a  fruitful  source  of  crime.  This  might 
be  presumed  from  the  nature  of  the  case,  without 
facts  ;  but  facts  establish  it. 

The  percentage  of  convicts  in  State  prisons,  who 
were  unable  to  read  on  admission,  as  reported  in 
1868,  was  :— 

In  the  whole  United  States, 28  per  cent. 

In  New  York, 15        " 

In  Pennsylvania, 16        " 

In  Maine, 10        " 

How  far  the  result  in  the  nation,  as  a  whole,  may 
have  been  influenced  by  the  presence  of  the  freed- 
men,  it  is  not  possible  for  us,  at  present,  to  determine; 
but  it  appears  that,  even  assuming  all  the  freedmen  to 
be  illiterate,  the  number  of  uninstructed  convicts  was 
nearly  three  to  two  of  what  it  should  have  been  in 
proportion  to  the  whole  number  of  the  illiterate  popu 
lation  of  the  United  States. 

To  the  percentage  of  illiterate  of  the  whole  adult 
population,  and  of  the  adult  native  white  population, 
respectively,  the  percentage  of  illiterate  convicts  was: — 

In  New  York, as  2^  and  10  to  i. 

In  Pennsylvania, as  2^  and    5  to  i. 

In  Maine, as  3^3  and  13  to  i. 

And,  after  making  the  proper  comparisons,  it  will 
appear  that,  if  all  the  people  in  these  States  had 


EDUCATION.  7 

learned  to  read,  the  number  of  State  prison  convicts 
would  probably  have  been  diminished  just  about  ten 
per  cent. 

DUTY  OF  THE  STATE. 

To  furnish  the  needful  education,  therefore,  to  her 
neglected  children,  is  what  the  State  owes  to  them — 
is  what  the  State  owes  to  herself.  Charity  requires 
it ;  prudence  and  statesmanship  command  it.  And, 
accordingly,  we  shall  not  hesitate  to  proceed  to  con 
sider  the  subject  in  both  these  relations. 

But  when  we  propose  to  bring  our  schools  to  bear 
especially  on  this  unfortunate  class,  we  are  met,  in 
limine,  with  the  objection  that  our  present  school  sys 
tem  already  provides  for  the  whole  case  ;  that  it  offers 
the  means  of  an  elementary  education  to  all  who 
choose  to  avail  themselves  of  its  benefits.  This  may, 
in  a  certain  sense,  be  true  ;  but  there  are  children,  too 
young  to  be  qualified  or  permitted  to  choose  for  them 
selves,  and  yet  the  choice  made  for  them  determines, 
it  may  be,  the  happiness  or  misery  of  their  whole 
lives  ;  determines  whether  they  are  to  be  useful  or 
pernicious  members  of  society  ;  and  shall  that  choice 
be  permitted  which  imperils  not  only  their  happiness, 
but  the  welfare  and  existence  of  the  State  ? 

It  is  precisely  those  children,  whose  parents  or 
guardians  are  unable  or  indisposed  to  provide  them 
with  an  education  ;  it  is  precisely  those,  for  whom  the 
State  is  most  interested  to  provide  and  secure  it ;  for 
other  children  would,  probably,  be  educated,  if  the 
State  did  not  intervene.  And  as  for  the  children,  so 
far  as  they  choose  for  themselves,  those  who  neglect 


§  EDUCATION. 

the  education  offered  them  in  the  free  schools,  prefer 
ring  the  pleasures  and  license  of  vagabondage  and 
truancy,  are  precisely  those  for  whom  such  education 
is  most  needed ;  for  a  desire  for  education  is  next  to 
education  itself  in  its  good  effects,  and  those  who 
determine  to  have  it  would  probably  obtain  it,  whether 
the  State  offered  it  to  them  or  not. 

Clearly  it  is  the  duty— that  is,  it  is  the  highest  interest 
of  the  State,  to  secure  the  education  of  these  "neg 
lected  children,"  if  possible;  and  the  only  questions 
are:  Is  it  possible  ?  and,  if  so,  How  can  it  be  done? 

To  attain  the  end  will,  of  course,  involve  something- 
like  what  is  called  "Compulsory  Education;"  and, 
against  such  a  scheme,  there  is  started  at  once  a  great 
variety  of  objections  and  difficulties.  Are  these  insup 
erable  ?  Without  argument,  it  might  be  assumed  that 

o  o 

they  are  not;  for,  "where  there  is  a  will  there  is  a  way." 
Moreover,  it  is  demonstrated  by  fact,  that  they  are  not 
insuperable ;  for  the  thing  has  been  done ;  and  where 
it  has  been  done,  it  has  never  yet  been  undone  or 
repented  of.  It  is  a  notable  fact,  that  no  country  or 
community  that  has  adopted  either  the  system  of  pub 
lic  schools  for  all,  or  that  has  gone  so  far  as  to  add  to 
it  that  of  compulsory  education,  has  ever  retraced  its 
steps. 

THE    SYSTEM  OF  COMPULSORY  EDUCATION    HAS    BEEN    LONG 
AND    SUCCESSFULLY    TRIED. 

This  system  has  been  long  established  in  Norway. 
During  the  four  hundred  years  of  the  subjection  of 
this  country  to  Denmark,  it  may  be  said  that  education 


EDUCATION.  9 

was  much  neglected,  and  ignorance  threatened  to  be 
come  universal.  The  law  rendering-  education  com 
pulsory  was  passed  in  1827,  the  agitation  of  which  was 
begun  in  1814,  soon  after  the  independence  of  the 
country  was  secured ;  and  the  enactments  have  been, 
since  that  time,  rendered  more  complete,  particularly 
by  the  law  of  1860.  The  consequence  is,  that  almost 
every  Norwegian  can  read  and  write.  The  school  age 
of  compulsory  attendance  is,  for  children  in  the  country, 
from  eight  to  fifteen  years,  and  in  the  towns,  from 
seven  to  fifteen.  Regular  attendance  upon  the  com 
mon  schools  is  enforced  by  fines  imposed  upon  the 
parents.  If  they  persist  in  neglecting  the  training  of 
their  children,  the  law  steps  in,  removes  the  children 
from  their  guardianship,  and  places  them  in  families, 
where  they  will  be  conscientiously  taught,  the  expenses 
being  collected  from  those  who  should  have  cared  for 
them.  In  Norway,  compulsory  education  was  the 
immediate  result  of  political  freedom. 

In  Sweden  it  was  an  agitation  of  ten  years  in  the 
House  of  Peasants  that  finally  constrained  the  gov 
ernment  to  take  up  the  subject.  Then  there  arose  a 
remarkable  and  unanimous  opposition  from  the  bish 
ops.  Some  held  the  matter  to  be  absolutely  local, 
and  one  with  which  the  State  should  not  meddle; 
others  declared  that,  if  schools  were  established,  the 
people  were  too  poor  to  send  their  children  properly 
clad;  others  maintained  that  the  education  of  the  peas 
antry  should  be  of  a  limited  character.  The  bishop  of 
Lund,  that  seat  of  the  ancient  university,  maintained 
that  popular  education  could  not  and  should  not  be 
introduced.  The  reply  of  the  celebrated  poet  Tegner, 


10  EDUCATION. 

then  bishop  of  the  diocese  of  Wexjo,  was  similar  in 
spirit.  To  the  question,  what  should  the  folk-schools 
teach?  he  answered,  "The  culture  of  the  laboring 
classes  ought,  principally,  to  be  religious  ;  this,  if  rightly 
imparted,  includes  morality;  all  other  is  to  be  regarded 
as  not  only  needless  but  more  hurtful  than  beneficial." 
Tegner  was  at  that  time  fifty-seven  years  of  age,  and 
had  been  a  bishop  about  twelve  years.  Notwithstand 
ing  the  opposition  of  the  established  church,  in  three 
years  from  the  time  these  answers  were  given,  the 
present  system  of  folk-schools  had  its  foundation  in 
an  act  of  the  Diet.  By  the  law  of  1842,  one  such  school 
was  required  to  be  maintained  in  each  socken,  both  in 
the  city  and  in  the  country.  [See  the  report  of  the 
United  States  Minister  at  Stockholm.]  The  result  has 
been  that  in  1868  ninety-seven  per  cent,  of  all  the 
children  in  Sweden  were  actually  attending  the  folk 
or  higher  schools,  or  were  receiving  certified  instruc 
tion  elsewhere.  Compulsory  education  in  Sweden 
may  be  carried  by  law  to  the  separation  of  children 
from  parents;  but  this  has  been  resorted  to  in  but  few 
instances,  and  only  where  the  poverty  of  the  parent 
rendered  it  necessary  for  the  parish  to  support  the 
child. 

There  is  in  Sweden  a  growing  sentiment  in  favor  of 
enforcing  universal  attendance,  avoiding,  if  possible, 
the  separation  of  parent  and  child.  Instruction  in  the 
folk-schools  is  practically  gratuitous. 

In  Prussia,  also,  as  is  well  known,  the  system  of 
compulsory  education  has  been  established  long  enough 
to  have  had  its  effect  upon  the  training  of  a  whole 
generation ;  and  it  is  perhaps  the  best  educated  gene- 


EDUCATION.  II 

ration  that  has  ever  lived,  or  that  is  anywhere  to  be 
found.  No  other  people  have  been  so  universally 
trained  in  the  elements  of  learning  and  useful  knowl 
edge.  This  is  the  people  that  has  revolutionized 
Europe  on  the  fields  of  Sadowa  and  Sedan  ;  and  the 
success  of  Prussia  in  her  great  contests  with  Austria 
and  with  France,  has  resulted  far  more  from  this  edu 
cated  intelligence  of  her  people  than  from  any  warlike 
arm,  or  any  strategy  or  military  science  of  her  generals. 
Austria  has  been  wise  enough  to  take  a  lesson  from 

o 

her  defeat,  and  imitating  the  policy  of  the  victor,  she 
has  entered  upon  a  course  of  political  and  popular 
improvement,  upon  a  system  of  liberality  and  progress, 
which,  if  persevered  in,  will  render  her  a  greater  nation 
than  she  has  ever  been.  One  of  the  greatest  benefits 
yet  conferred  upon  the  working  classes  of  Austria,  is 
the  general  school  bill  of  izj-th  May,  1869,  which  makes 
national  education  compulsory,  and  greatly  elevates 
the  standard  of  it.  In  accordance  with  the  law,  com 
pulsory  attendance  at  school  begins  with  every  child  at 
the  age  of  six,  and  is  continued  uninterruptedly  until 
the  age  of  fourteen.  But  even  then,  the  child  is  only 
allowed  to  leave  school  on  production  of  certified  proof 
that  he  has  thoroughly  acquired  the  full  amount  of  in 
formation  which  this  great  law  fixes  as  the  absolute 
minimum  of  education  for  every  Austrian  citizen. 
Nor  are  any  private  schools  tolerated  by  the  govern 
ment  which  do  not  efficiently  provide  the  prescribed 
amount  of  secular  instruction  ;  although  so  long  as 
this  condition  is  fulfilled,  the  law  imposes  no  limit  to 
private  educational  establishments. 

The  misfortunes  and  miseries  of  France  have  taught 


12  EDUCATION. 

her  the  same  lesson  ;  and  it  is  now  stated,  on  good 
authority,  that  the  French  republican  government  has 
it  in  contemplation  to  establish  for  that  country  a 
thorough  system  of  universal  compulsory  education. 
Had  she  established  such  a  system  thirty  years  ago 
the  name  of  Sedan  would  have  remained  in  compara 
tive  obscurity  ;  the  myriads  of  her  soldiers  would  have 
acquired  their  knowledge  of  German  geography  in  a 
more  satisfactory  way  than  that  in  which  it  was  actually 
forced  upon  them,  and  the  Paris  commune  would 
either  have  never  existed,  or  would  not  have  found  the 
ignorant  mob  of  idlers  and  vagabonds  that  were  ready 
to  execute  its  savage  decrees  of  vandalism  and  murder. 

England,  too,  has  been  roused  at  length  from  her 
lethargy.  Her  elementary  education  act  was  passed 
August  9th,  1870.  This  act  of  a  liberal  progressive 
administration,  has  made  a  step  towards  the  thorough 
instruction  and  education  of  the  masses  of  the  English 
people,  which  an  established  church  and  an  aristocratic 
State,  with  all  the  wealth  of  the  richest  country  in  the 
world  at  their  command  for  centuries,  had  neglected 
or  failed  to  accomplish  or  even  to  undertake.  This 
education  act  includes  the  compulsory  feature,  and  its 
detailed  provisions,  the  result  of  a  most  exhaustive 
investigation  and  discussion,  may  be  referred  to  as 
embodying  an  eminently  practical  effort  towards  solv 
ing  and  removing  the  difficulties  which  embarrass  the 
subject. 

Thus,  in  Europe,  the  system  of  compulsory  education 
has  been  established  in  countries  chiefly  agricultural, 
and  in  others  largely  commercial  and  manufacturing  ; 
in  countries  with  a  scattered  rural  population,  and  in 


EDUCATION.  13 

others  with  cities  as  large  as  our  own  ;  in  countries 
comparatively  poor  and  peaceful,  and  in  others  of  the 
greatest  wealth  and  warlike  spirit;  in  countries  where 
the  distribution  of  wealth  is  most  equal,  and  in  others 
where  it  is  most  unequal.  And,  wherever  it  has  been 
tried,  it  has  proved  successful  and  satisfactory;  no  ret 
rograde  step  has  been  taken  or  even  thought  of. 

Nor  is  it  in  Europe  only  that  the  system  has  been 
introduced.  Massachusetts  has,  for  several  years,  been 
trying  it  with  some  limitations,  but  with  a  constant  and 
increasing  tendency  towards  a  more  stringent  and  ab 
solute  enforcement  of  the  rule,  and  with  eminently 
satisfactory  results.  Not  only  Massachusetts,  one  of 
our  oldest  States,  and,  side  by  side  with  our  own 
Pennsylvania,  the  very  cradle  of  American  freedom, 
and  where  the  ancient  fires  of  liberty  still  burn  as 
brightly  as  anywhere  else  in  our  independent  country; 
not  only  old  Massachusetts  in  the  east,  but  Nebraska 
in  the  west, — one  of  the  most  youthful  States  in  the 
Union,  where  the  life-blood  of  liberty  and  progress  is 
throbbing  with  fresh  and  buoyant  energy, — Nebraska 
has,  by  the  frame rs  of  her  constitution,  sought  to  engraft 
this  feature  upon  her  school  system  in  her  fundamental 
law  ;  a  provision,  however,  which  has  been  rendered 
prospective,  in  consequence  of  the  rejection  of  the 
constitution  because  of  an  objectionable  feature  in  the 
article  on  taxation. 

The  superintendent  of  public  schools  in  Massachu 
setts  reports,  in  1870,  that  the  law  for  the  suppression 
of  "  truancy,"  as  applied  in  Boston,  is  working  satisfac 
torily.  The  city  is  divided  into  ten  truant  districts, 
one  truant  officer  bein^  assigned  to  each  district. 

o  o 


14  EDUCATION. 

These  officers  are  expected  to  give  their  whole  time  to 
the  investigation  of  cases  of  truancy,  reported  to  them 
by  the  teachers  of  their  respective  districts,  and  in 
securing  the  attendance  of  absentees — that  is,  of  chil 
dren  whose  names  are  not  enrolled  in  the  schools, 
and  who  are,  therefore,  not  known,  technically,  as 
"truants."  Massachusetts,  also,  requires  a  certificate 
of  a  certain  number  of  months  attendance  in  school,  as 
a  condition  of  the  employment  of  children  in  any 
manufactory. 

The  Massachusetts  Board  of  Education,  in  their 
report  of  1871,  say: — 

"By  the  present  law,  attendance  at  school  for  three 
months  in  each  year  is  rendered  compulsory  for  every 
child  between  the  ages  of  eight  and  fourteen,  except  in 
certain  special  cases,  while  the  towns  are  required  to 
maintain  their  schools  at  least  six  months  in  each  year. 

"  The  board  recommend  that  the  statute  be  changed, 
so  as  to  require  attendance  for  the  whole  period,  at 
least,  during  which  schools  are  required  to  be  main 
tained,  believing  that  attendance  upon  the  schools 
should  be  compulsory  for  the  child  for  the  same  term 
in  which  the  maintenance  of  the  school  is  compulsory 
for  the  tax-payers.  Since  the  only  hope  of  security 
and  prosperity  for  a  republic  rests  in  the  virtuous  in 
telligence  of  its  citizens,  the  rightfulness  of  compulsory 
education  is  generally  admitted.  Salus  popidi  suprema 
lex.  The  necessity  of  enforcing  this  right  arises  from 
the  existence  in  our  community  of  a  large  and  growing 
class  of  persons,  not  only  ignorant  themselves,  but 
only  too  willing  to  keep  their  children  in  ignorance  for 
the  sake  of  the  pittance  which  may  be  earned  by  un 
skilled  juvenile  labor." 


EDUCATION.  15 

From  New  York  comes  the  voice  in  regard  to  the 
crying  evil  of  absenteeism :  "  There  is  no  remedy 
that  I  know  of  but  compulsory  attendance."  The 
superintendent  of  public  schools  declares  that  "the 
primary  object  of  the  State,  in  bestowing  free  education 
upon  its  citizens,  is  not  to  benefit  individuals  as  such, 
but  to  qualify  them  properly  for  their  relations  and 
duties  to  each  other  as  members  of  the  same  commu 
nity."  The  superintendent  of  the  schools  in  Maine 
has  put  the  argument  into  this  form:  "The  power 
which  compels  the  citizen  to  pay  his  annual  tax  for  the 
support  of  schools  should,  in  like  manner,  fill  the 
schools  with  all  of  those  for  whose  benefit  that  contri 
bution  was  made.  It  is  in  the  light  of  a  solemn  com 
pact  between  the  citizen  and  the  State  community. 
The  private  citizen  contributes  of  his  means,  under  the 
established  rule  of  the  State,  for  the  education  of  the 
youth,  with  a  view  to  protection  of  person  and  security 
to  property ;  the  State,  compelling  such  contributions, 
is  under  reciprocal  obligation  to  provide  and  secure  the 
complete  education  for  which  the  contribution  has 
been  made.  This  implies  the  exercise  of  State  power, 
and  involves  compulsory  education  as  a  duty  to  the 
tax-payer.  The  State  builds  prisons  and  penitentiaries 
for  the  protection  of  society,  and  taxes  society  for  the 
same.  But  does  she  stop  here,  leaving  him  who  has 
violated  the  law  to  be  pursued  by  the  community  in  a 
mass — to  be  apprehended  by  a  crowd  and  borne  by  a 
throng  to  the  place  of  incarceration  ?  No  ;  she  pur 
sues  the  criminal  through  legitimate  instrumentalities, 
ferrets  him  out  by  the  sharpest  means  of  detection,  and 
eventually  secures  that  safety  and  protection  to  society 


1 6  EDUCATION. 

for  which  society  has  been  taxed.  Now,  to  prevent 
,  crime — to  anticipate  and  shut  it  off  by  proper  compul 
sory  efforts  in  the  school-room,  working-  with  and 
moulding  early  childhood  and  youth  '  to  the  principles 
of  morality  and  justice,  and  a  sacred  regard  for  truth, 
love  of  country,  humanity,  and  a  universal  benevo 
lence,  sobriety,  industry,  and  frugality,  chastity,  moder 
ation,  and  temperance,  and  all  other  virtues  which  are 
the  ornaments  of  society'  [cited  from  the  Constitution 
of  Maine],  the  State  not  only  has  the  right  to  inaugu 
rate  such  methods  as  may  be  deemed  best,  but  is 
under  strict  obligation  to  do  so  by  all  the  means  in  her 
power." 

The  world  is  moving  !  Shall  Pennsylvania  remain 
behind  ? 

CLASSIFICATION    OF    THE    EVIL. 

The  evil  to  be  remedied  is  multiform.  The  absen 
tees  from  the  schools  may  be  distributed  into  various 
classes.  There  are  absentees  from  the  public  schools 
who  are  provided  at  least  with  an  elementary  education 
at  home,  or  in  private  or  charitable  institutions.  Of 
these  nothing  further  is  required  but  the  ascertainment 
of  this  fact ;  and  their  case  is  then  to  be  entirely  set 
aside  from  any  idea  of  compulsion  or  control. 

For  the  rest,  among  the  absentees  from  the  schools 
are  :— 

i.   Children  living  in  the  streets,  without  guardian- 

o  o 

ship  or  supervision,  and  without  employment,  except 
such  as  they  may  choose  or  chance  to  pick  up  for  them 
selves. 


EDUCATION.  17 

2.  Children    employed  in   manufacturing  drudgery, 
not    only  in    great    cotton   or    woolen    manufactories, 
but    who  are  crowded    into   cellars   and    garrets  and 
cramped    and    comfortless    rooms — working,    for   ex 
ample,  in    manipulating    tobacco,  and    in  all   sorts  of 
simple  drudgery. 

3.  Children,  in  the  city,  kept  at  home  by  their  pa 
rents  to  run  errands  or  help  them  in  their  daily  toil, 
trade,  or  business;  as  about  grocers'  shops  or  butchers' 
stalls,  or  other  purely  unimproving  occupations,  equiv 
alent  to  idleness  at  home. 

4.  Children  in  the  country,  kept,  from  their  earliest 
years,  constantly  employed  in  agricultural  labors. 

OUTLINES    OF    THE    REMEDY    PROPOSED. 

It  is  necessary  for  the  best  interests  of  the  State, 
and  of  the  children  themselves,  that  at  least  an  ele 
mentary  education  should  be  secured  to  all  these 
classes ;  but  it  is  not  equally  necessary  for  all.  For 
the  first  class  it  is  most  necessary,  and  its  importance 
diminishes  in  the  order  of  the  enumeration,  until  the 
last  class,  in  which  it  is  least  important.  For,  any 
honest  employment,  consistent  with  health,  is  better 
than  idle  vagabondage ;  and  the  knowledge  of  some 
trade,  or  of  agriculture  (which  is  the  healthiest  em 
ployment  of  all  for  a  child,  both  morally  and  physi 
cally),  is  even  more  important  towards  making  a  good 
citizen  than  a  knowledge  of  reading,  writing,  or  arith 
metic. 


1 8  EDUCATION. 

The  truant  and  employment  laws  of  Massachusetts, 
with  some  fuller  provisions,  might  answer,  for  the  rem 
edy,  in  case  of  the  first  and  second  classes.  Of  the 
first  class,  the  attendance  at  school  should  be  required 
and  secured  absolutely ;  and  for  those  among  them  en 
tirely  destitute  of  homes  and  means  of  support,  proper 
refuges,  maintenance  and  guardianship  should  be  pro 
vided  at  the  public  expense.  The  safety  of  the  com 
munity  demands  it;  the  economy  of  the  tax-payer 
requires  it ;  for  it  is,  in  the  end,  the  cheapest  way  by 
which  the  case  can  be  disposed  of,  and  the  only  way  to 
make  the  tax  already  paid  effectual  to  accomplish  its 
object. 

And  it  is  to  be  remembered  that,  though  this  form  of 
the  evil  may  be  largely  local,  its  dangerous  conse 
quences  and  the  interest  in  having  it  remedied  are  not 
local.  The  character  of  great  cities  exerts  a  powerful, 
and  often  a  sadly  controlling,  influence  on  the  country, 
near  and  remote.  They  may  be  fountains  of  blessing 
to  a  State,  or  they  may  be  sources  of  wide-spread  cor 
ruption,  nests  of  iniquity,  festering  sores  upon  the  body 
politic.  The  children  that  grow  up  neglected  in  the 
city  do  not  always  remain  there.  They  may  carry  the 
pestilential  influence  of  their  vices  all  over  the  State. 
While,  if  they  were  rescued  from  ruin,  trained  up  in 
useful  knowledge  and  moral  habits,  they  would  almost 
certainly  be  found  in  large  proportion  distributed  over 
the  whole  area  of  the  State,  rendering  efficient  assist 
ance  in  the  development  of  its  resources  and  the 
elevation  of  its  character.  Their  education,  therefore, 
concerns  not  only  the  city  wherein  they  are  found,  but 
the  whole  Commonwealth. 


EDUCATION.  19 

The  safety  of  the  State  may  not  be  so  much  im 
perilled  by  the  neglect  of  the  second  class  as  of  the 
first ;  but,  in  point  of  fact,  an  almost  equal  positive  loss 
of  wealth,  i.  e.,  of  productive  labor,  is  incurred.  Besides, 
it  is  permitting  outrageous  cruelty  to  the  children;  and 
if  the  State,  by  solemn  enactment,  may  provide  for  the 
prevention  of  cruelty  to  animals,  though  inflicted  by 
the  poorest  man  in  the  very  act  of  earning  his  daily 
bread,  will  she  not  provide  for  the  prevention  of  cruelty 
to  her  own  children,  however  the  necessities  of  the 
parents  may  seem  to  justify  or  excuse  it  ?  In  these 
cases,  the  parents  or  employes  should  be  absolutely 
required,  under  appropriate  penalties,  to  send  the 
children  to  school  a  certain  portion  of  the  year,  until 
they  have  acquired  at  least  those  rudiments  of  knowl 
edge  which  should  be  adjudged  by  statute  to  constitute 
the  minimum  of  an  elementary  education.  If  obedience 
to  such  a  law  is  refused,  and  if,  from  the  poverty  of  the 
parties  or  from  whatever  cause,  the  penalties  cannot 
be  enforced,  then,  as  in  the  former  case,  the  State 
should  interpose,  and  take  the  care  and  maintenance 
of  the  children  into  its  own  hands.  To  provide  for 
their  maintenance,  by  compelling  them  to  devote  to 
manual  and  exhausting  labor  that  childhood  which 
should  be  devoted  to  the  studies  and  recreations  of 
school,  is,  in  the  end,  the  most  expensive  way  to  the 
State  in  which  it  could  be  provided  for. 

Of  the  third  and  fourth  classes,  the  attendance  at 
school  might  be  required  by  a  similar  process  with 
similar  provisions,  and  for  similar,  though,  at  least  in 
the  fourth  class,  not  equally  imperative  reasons.  Such 
is  a  general  outline  of  a  remedy  proposed  for  the  great 
evil  in  question.  But  it  meets  with  many 


20  EDUCATION. 

OBJECTIONS. 

1.  "It  would   interfere  with  personal  liberty."      So 
does   the   imposition   of  military   service   or  training. 
So  does  the  requisition  to  serve  on  juries  or  to  aid 
the  sheriff  in  the  posse  comitatus.     So   does   the   law 
abating  nuisances,  or  making  it  penal   to   sell   certain 
articles  without  a  license.     If  the  safety  and  welfare  of 
the  State  are  sufficient  reasons  for  those  interferences 
with    personal  liberty,  why  should   not  the   same    be 
sufficient  reasons  in  the  other  and  more  urgent  case  ? 
Indeed,  we  might  as  well  admit  it  to  be  a  part  of  the 
personal  liberty  of   the   citizen   to   get  drunk   or   go 
naked  in  the  streets,  or  set  fire  to  his  house,  or  starve 
his  family,  as  to  have  children,  and,  that  he  may  use 
them    only  for    his  own    accommodation,  or  in    mere 
wantonness    to    cast   them    upon    the    community    in 
vicious    ignorance  and  sottish   imbecility.     If  the  law 
may  restrain  a  man  from  cruelly  beating  his  horse  or 
his  mule,  shall  it  be  considered  an  insufferable  inter 
ference  with  his  personal  liberty  to  forbid  his  dwarfing 
the  minds,  debasing  the   morals,  stunting  the  bodies, 
and  enfeebling  the  constitutions  of  his   children  ?     Is 
the  State  more  interested  in  the  care  of  oxen  than  of 
men? 

2.  "It  would  be  an  interference  with  the  rights  of 


conscience." 


So  may  be  the  imposition  of  military  service,  or  the 
requisition  of  personal  aid  to  the  sheriff;  but  this  case 
need  involve  no  such  interference  at  all,  unless  men  have 
a  conscientious  repugnance  to  children  being  taught 


EDUCATION.  21 

to  read  and  write,  and  to  lead  moral  and  virtuous 
lives,  instead  of  being  left  to  grow  up  in  ignorance  and 
vice.  And,  even  as  for  religious  instruction,  it  would 
be  to  assume  a  strange  position  to  say,  "  the  instructor 
may  teach  the  child  that  '  twice  two  are  four ;'  he  may 
even  say,  '  be  temperate  and  chaste,'  but  I  have  con 
scientious  scruples  against  his  saying,  *  obey  the  com 
mandments  of  Almighty  God.'  '  Still,  all  formal 
religious  instruction  or  exercises  in  the  schools  that 
children  are  required  to  attend,  including,  under  that 
category,  even  the  reading  of  the  Holy  Scriptures,  if 
so  it  is  insisted  upon*  may  be  confined  to  certain 
prescribed  periods  at  the  opening  or  close  of  the  school- 
day  ;  and  all  children  may  be  excused  from  attendance 
at  those  periods,  whose  parents  or  guardians  should 
expressly  desire  it. 

3.   "  The  State  is  not  a  benevolent  institution,  or  an 
association  for  moral  reform." 


*And  who  will  insist  upon  it  ?  The  opposition  to  the  reading  of  the  Holy 
Scriptures  in  the  common  schools,  coming  from  professed  infidels,  Mohammedans, 
Jews,  or  Chinese,  is  scarcely  of  sufficient  account,  in  this  Christian  country,  to  over 
rule  the  wishes  of  all  other  parties.  The  real  brunt  of  the  opposition  comes  from 
a  professed  Christian  body — the  Roman  Catholic  Church ;  and  it  should  be  distinctly 
understood,  once  for  all,  that  if  the  Bible  is  banished  from  our  public  schools  it 
is  because  that  body  of  Christians  demands  its  banishment.  And  then  let  it  be 
considered  with  what  force  and  fairness  that  church  can  turn  around  and  raise  the 
cry  of  "godless  schools."  By  whose  fault  are  they  godless  ?  Let  the  responsibility 
rest  where  it  belongs.  Let  it  be  remembered  that  the  same  people  who  cry  out 
most  lustily  against  the  "  godless  schools  "  are  the  people  who  have  insisted  upon 
utterly  banishing  from  the  schools  the  very  reading  of  the  Holy  Scriptures.  As 
for  the  different  versions  of  the  Bible,  that,  except  with  bigots,  could  not  be  a 
matter  of  essential  moment,  and  it  might  easily  be  arranged  that  the  question, 
whether  the  Protestant  or  the  Douay  version  should  be  read,  should  be  determined 
by  the  majority  in  each  school  division  or  school  board. 


EDUCATION. 

But  the  State  has  its  almshouses  ;  it  aids  in  the  sup 
port  of  institutions  for  the  deaf  and  dumb,  the  blind, 
the  feeble-minded ;  it  aids  in  establishing  and  in  sus 
taining-  houses  of  refuge  and  schools  of  reform  for  the 
youthful  victims  of  neglect,  incorrigibility,  or  vice.  Its 
legislature  has  its  standing  committee  on  vice  and  im 
morality,  and  has  constituted  this  commission  as  its 
"  Board  of  Public  Charities."  Surely  it  will  hardly  be 
urged  as  a  proper  reason  against  a  legal  enactment, 
that  it  will  do  some  good, — that  it  will  tend  to  accom 
plish  even  the  highest  ends  of  benevolence  and  morality. 
But  here  it  is  the  very  safety  and  welfare  of  the  State 
that  is  appealed  to,  as  the  proper  object  of  the  pro 
posed  legislation.  To  prevent  vice  and  crime  by 
removing  their  causes,  and  thus  to  prevent  their  con 
sequences  of  poverty  and  misery  and  shame,  of  injury 
and  loss  to  society,  is  quite  as  consistent  with  the 
proper  functions  of  the  State,  as  to  punish  them  after 
they  have  borne  their  fruits. 

4.  "  It  would  vastly  increase  the  cost  and  burden  of 
the  public  schools." 

If  it  should  do  so,  it  would  still  be  only  as  the  nec 
essary  means  of  securing  for  all  the  education  which 
it  is  the  constitutional  duty  of  the  legislature  to  provide. 
But  it  would  probably  not  increase  the  cost  of  the 
schools  nearly  so  much  as  it  might  be  supposed  or 
apprehended,  while  it  might  be  made  greatly  to  increase 
their  general  efficiency.  It  is  to  be  assumed  that 
school  accommodations  are  already  provided  sufficient 
for  all  the  children  of  school  age  in  the  Commonwealth. 
But  even  if  it  were  necessary  to  reserve  or  supply 


EDUCATION.  23 

separate  schools  for  those  whose  children  do  not  now 
attend  school  at  all,  and  if  to  these  were  added  the 
incorrigibly  truant  and  the  unreasonably  absent  from 
the  other  schools,  together  with  those  who  for  misbe 
havior  or  negligence  are  expelled  from  them,  it  would 
only  leave  more  room  in  the  other  schools  for  the 
wants  of  an  increasing  population,  and  would,  in  the 
long  run,  involve  only  a  change  in  the  distribution  of 
the  whole  number  of  children.  The  result  would,  in 
fact,  be  that  the  average  attendance  in  the  other 
schools  would  be  much  raised ;  the  conduct  and  indus 
try  of  the  pupils  would  be  improved,  and  in  the  end 
the  number  to  be  provided  for  in  the  separate  school 
would  be  very  small  indeed.  And  as  to  the  meagre 
remnant  of  extremely  destitute  children  which  would 
be,  we  believe,  continually  reduced  under  the  system 
we  propose,  for  whom  maintenance  as  well  as  instruc 
tion  would  have  to  be  provided,  it  is  not  easy  to  see 
how  the  State  can  decline  the  duty  of  making  the  pro 
vision,  or  why,  while  it  has  its  numerous  asylums  of 
kindred  character,  it  should  seek  to  decline  it.  We 
think,  therefore,  that  the  expense  would  not  be 
"vastly"  increased;  but  whatever  the  cost  would  be, 
it  ought  to  be  cheerfully  met. 

5.  "It  would  encourage  reckless  marriages,  and  the 
reckless  idleness  and  wastefulness  of  parents." 

This  is  the  sort  of  objection  that  has  been  made, 
and  may  continue  to  be  made  against  all  relief  afforded 
to  the  poor  and  wretched.  There  is  an  abuse  to  be 
guarded  against,  but  it  is  not  to  be  guarded  against 
by  leaving  the  destitute  and  miserable  to  rot  and 


24  EDUCATION. 

perish ;  but  only  by  giving  the  relief  in  such  judicious 
ways  and  degrees  as  to  avoid  abuses  as  far  as  possi 
ble.  The  same  good  judgment  should  be  exercised 
in  this  case.  But  the  objection  is  the  less  applicable 
here,  because  the  natural  and  proper  effect  of  the 
legislation  proposed  would  be,  on  the  whole,  to  dimin 
ish  poverty  and  wretchedness,  as  well  as  ignorance, 
vice,  and  crime.  Meantime  it  does  not  appear  that 
the  evil  consequence  alleged  has  actually  followed 
where  education  has  been  made  universally  compul 
sory,  whether  in  Sweden,  in  Norway,  or  in  Germany. 

6.  "  Merely  to  learn  to  read  and  write  will  not  make 
better  citizens  or  diminish  crime." 

Here  it  is  to  be  observed,  first  of  all,  that  the  prac 
tical  alternative  is  not,  as  is  often  invidiously  suggested, 
between  a  knowledge  of  reading  and  writing  on  the 
one  hand,  and  habits  of  morality  and  religion  or  a 
knowledge  of  a  trade  on  the  other  ;  but  between  so 

o 

much  knowledge  as  is  involved  in  reading  and  writing 
and  no  education  at  all ;  between  so  much  knowledge 
as  that  or  blank  ignorance  or  a  training  only  in  habits 
of  vice  and  crime. 

In  the  second  place,  so  far  from  its  being  true  that 
such  a  modicum  of  learning,  or  any  amount  of  knowl 
edge,  is  naturally  associated  with  immorality,  the  plain 
fact  is  that  there  is  a  natural  affinity  between  knowl 
edge  and  good  morals  ;  between  the  normal  culture 
of  the  intellect  and  of  the  heart ;  between  truth  and 
rectitude  ;  and  that  a  knowledge  of  reading  and  writ 
ing  increases  both  the  means  and  the  tendency  to 
acquire  both  the  knowledge  and  the  habits  of  virtue 


EDUCATION.  25 

and  good  morals.  This  is  the  general  law,  and  the 
dissociation  of  knowledge  from  virtue,  the  perversion 
of  knowledge  to  the  aid  and  development  of  vice  and 
iniquity,  which,  it  is  true,  may  sometimes  happen,  and 
which  has  happened  in  some  notorious  and  terrible 
examples,  is  one  of  the  most  monstrous  abuses  known 
in  human  experience. 

But,  in  the  third  place,  it  is  not  proposed  that  these 
children  should   be   taught  to  read   and  write  to  the 

o 

exclusion  of  all  moral  or  religious  instruction.  The 
public  schools  of  Pennsylvania  are  neither  immoral 
nor  godless  schools.  Ninety-nine  in  a  hundred  of  the 
teachers  are,  and  would  continue  to  be,  moral,  and 
nine-tenths  of  them  religious  persons.  Moral  and 
religious  instruction  and  training  would  be  given, 
radiating  constantly  in  an  unconscious  influence  from 
the  person,  bearing,  and  example  of  the  teacher ; 
from  the  very  air  and  order  of  the  school-room  ;  and 
in  formal  lessons,  too,  and  special  exercises,  with  such 
rare  exceptions  for  weak  consciences  as  have  been 
before  referred  to.  Moreover,  we  here  add,  that  all 
the  time,  if  any,  besides  Sundays  and  Saturdays,  which 
any  parents  may  require  for  their  children  to  receive 
actual  religious  'instruction  from  their  own  religious 

o  c> 

teachers,  would  be  freely  accorded  to  them.  The 
church  or  the  churches,  and  any  benevolent,  moral, 
and  religious  associations  or  persons,  are,  and  will  be, 
of  course,  at  perfect  liberty  to  give  to  these  neglected 
children  now  in  question,  not  only  moral  and  religious 
instruction,  but  as  full  an  education,  in  all  respects,  as 
they  please.  The  State  will  not  interfere  with  them. 
The  State,  in  her  school  system,  does  not  interfere 


26  EDUCATION. 

with  the  church  at  all.  The  church  is,  and  always  has 
been,  and  always  will  be,  while  the  fundamental  princi 
ples  of  our  civil  and  social  polity  remain  what  they 
are,  at  perfect  liberty  to  educate  in  religion,  morals, 
and  every  kind  of  learning,  all  the  children  in  the 
State,  if  she  will,  and  if  she  can  induce  them  to  receive 
her  instructions.  Of  course  the  State  will  not,  and 
cannot  consistently,  compel  the  attendance  of  the  chil 
dren  upon  such  schools.  The  church  is  at  as  full 
liberty  to  do  all  she  will  and  can  with  the  State  system 
of  public  schools,  even  including  in  that  system  the 
feature  of  compulsory  attendance  '  (for  this  feature 
is  never  to  be  applied  to  children  who  receive 
sufficient  instruction  elsewhere)  ;  the  church  has, 
and  will  have,  with  all  this,  just  as  full  and  free 
scope  for  all  her  benevolent  activities  as  she  ever 
had  or  could  have  with  no  State  schools  whatever. 
The  church  has  had  her  opportunity,  without  these 
latter  schools,  falsely  and  slanderously  styled  "  god 
less,"  and  with  immense  revenues  and  means  in  her 
hands, — means  and  revenues,  in  many  cases,  bestowed 
upon  her  for  this  very  purpose, — in  Spain,  in  Italy,  in 
Portugal,  in  the  states  of  South  America,  and  even  in 
England ;  and  what  has  been  the  result  as  to  the  edu 
cation  of  the  masses  of  the  poorer  and  of  the  so-called 
lower  classes  of  the  community  ?  In  many  cases,  as  in 
Sweden,  she  seems  to  have  been  positively  principled 
against  their  education.  The  "church"  has  reason  to 
hide  her  head  in  silent  shame  or  humble  confession  at 
her  own  neglect,  rather  than  to  carp  at  the  state  for 
its  imperfect  efforts  to  supply  her  lack  of  service  to 
remedy,  as  it  may,  the  consequences  of  her  unfaithful- 


EDUCATION.  27 

ness.  Meanwhile,  the  state  npt  only  leaves  the  church 
at  liberty  to  act  for  herself  and  in  her  own  way,  but 
invites  her,  and  invites  all  good  men,  to  render  their 
aid  in  this  work  so  fraught  with  beneficence  towards 
its  particular  objects,  as  well  as  interwoven  with  the 
necessary  conditions  of  the  public  welfare.  And  it  is 
no  small  encouragement  to  the  efforts  of  the  state  in 
this  direction,  to  believe  and  expect,  as  we  have  good 
reason  to  do,  that  those  efforts  will  be  seconded,  and 
their  expense  greatly  curtailed,  not  only  by  the  spon 
taneous  favor  of  public  opinion,  but  by  the  systematic 
aid  of  Christian  benevolence,  in  furnishing  homes  and 
refuges,  as  well  as  a  good  training,  to  many  of  these 
children  of  neglect  and  want.* 

#After  so  many  repeated  and  complete  explanations  and  refutations  as  have  been 
made,  the  persistent  efforts  to  hold  up  the  system  of  secular  education  in  common 
schools  to  obloquy,  as  being  hostile,  in  any  sense  or  degree,  to  the  religious  edu 
cation  of  the  young,  is  one  of  the  most  astonishing  and  inexplicable  instances  of 
an  inveterate  and  perverse  misunderstanding,  or  of  obstinate  and  unreasoning 
misrepresentation,  to  be  found  in  the  history  of  human  thought  and  human  con 
troversy.  There  is  absolutely  not  the  slightest  antithesis  or  interference  between 
the  two.  The  church  is  left  just  as  free  as  she  ever  was  or  could  be  to  give  all 
the  religious  education  she  can  or  will  to  any  and  all  children,  and  all  other 
education,  too,  if  she  chooses.  The  common-school  system  leaves  her  entirely 
untrammeled  to  discharge  her  whole  duty  in  the  training  of  the  young;  for  as  to 
the  assertion,  sometimes  made,  that  a  merely  secular  education  is  in  itself  worse 
than  absolute  ignorance,  it  scarely  deserves  the  honor  of  a  refutation.  And  yet, 
from  the  persistent  tone  and  reiterated  assertions  of  certain  ecclesiastical  opponents 
of  the  common  schools,  one  would  suppose  the  church  was,  by  this  system,  abso 
lutely  stripped  of  her  rights  of  training  her  children  in  religious  culture  at  all,  and 
that  all  the  children  taught  in  the  common  schools  were  actually  deprived  of  a 
religious  education,  which  they  would  otherwise  receive,  and  positively  con 
demned  to  sheer  godlessness,  irreligion,  and  immorality.  On  the  contrary,  the 
point  is  just  this  :  the  state,  from  the  nature  of  the  case,  cannot  and  will  not  give 
a  religious  education  to  her  children, — though  she  will  have  ihe  Bible  read  in  her 
schools  until  the  church  forbids  it ; — but  she  will  give  a  secular  education  to  all 
her  children,  unless  the  church  herself  or  some  other  party  chooses  to  give  such 
an  education  to  any  or  all,  with  or  without  a  religious  training.  In  carrying  out 


28  EDUCATION. 

In  the  fourth  place,  if  by  "good  citizens"  is  meant 
useful,  productive  members  of  society,  it  is  not  pre 
tended  that  all  which  is  of  importance  to  make  men 
such,  is,  to  teach  them  to  read  and  write ;  and  if  the 
state  is  disposed  and  can  afford  to  secure  to  these 
children  the  knowledg-e  of  some  trade  or  handicraft 

o 

also,  so  much  the  better.  Meantime,  the  mere  knowing 
how  to  read  and  write  tends,  and  powerfully  tends,  in 
the  right  direction;  tends  towards  making  men  useful 
and  productive  citizens;  tends,  therefore,  to  increase 
the  wealth  and  prosperity  of  the  State,  and  thus  to 
repay,  and  more  than  repay,  all  that  it  may  have  cost. 
Abundant  evidence  on  this  head  has  been  collected  by 
the  United  States  Commissioner  of  Education,  and 
published  in  his  report  for  1870,  pages  439-467.  The 
following  questions  were  submitted  to  a  great  number 
and  variety  of  competent  witnesses  :— 

i.  Have  you  observed  a  difference  in  skill,  aptitude, 
and  amount  of  work  executed  by  persons  you  have 

this  plan,  the  state  is  not,  here  with  us,  hampered  or  hindered  by  those  compli 
cations  which  exist  in  most  European  countries,  where  they  have  an  established 
or  state  religion,  side  by  side  with  dissenting  religious  bodies ;  and  where  an  out 
cry  is  naturally  created,  whether  in  the  state  schools  the  religious  instruction  of 
the  established  church  is  given  or  not  given.  Especially  is  this  outcry  occasioned, 
and  justly,  if  the  funds  of  the  established  church  are  diverted  by  the  state  to  the 
maintenance  of  a  system  of  merely  secular  instruction.  There  is  also  equal  reason 
for  complaint,  when  the  law  of  compulsory  education  absolutely  requires  that  all 
children  shall  receive  their  education  in  the  state  schools,  whether  religious  instruc 
tion  is  given  in  them  or  not ;  so  that,  even  if  the  church  or  private  schools  furnish 
an  equally  good  secular  education,  no  such  substitution  is  accepted  for  that  given 
in  the  state  schools.  This  may  well  be  considered  as  interfering  with  the  right 
of  conscience  and  with  personal  and  religious  liberty.  But  nobody  proposes  that 
compulsory  education,  with  us,  should  assume  this  form.  Only  a  certain  training 
in  the  public  schools  is  to  be  required  of  all  children  of  a  certain  age,  or  its 
equivalent  elsewhere. 


EDUCATION.  29 

employed,  arising  from  a  difference  in  their  education, 
and  independent  of  natural  abilities  ? 

2.  Do  those  who  can  merely  read  and  write,  and  who 
merely  possess  those  rudiments  of  an  education,  other 
things  being  equal,  show  any  greater  skill  and  fidelity 
as  laborers,  skilled  or  unskilled,  or  as  artisans,  than  do 
those  who  are  not  able  to  read  and  write  ?  and,  if  so, 
how  much  would  such  additional  skill,  &c.  tend  to 
increase  the  productiveness  of  .their  services,  and,  con 
sequently,  their  wages  ? 

The  answers  to  these  questions  all  tend  to  establish 
the  point  that  the  mere  ability  to  read  and  write, 
by  even  an  unskilled  laborer,  adds,  on  an  average, 
from  twenty-five  to  fifty  per  cent,  to  his  value  and 
efficiency. 

Similar  questions  were  propounded  to  large  num 
bers  of  intelligent  workmen,  and  of  observers,  who 
were  neither  employers  nor  workmen,  and  all  with  the 
same  result. 

It  cannot  be  doubted,  therefore,  that  the  wealth  of 
the  State  would  be  greatly  promoted  by  giving  at  least 
a  rudimentary  education  to  those  thousands  of  her 
children  who  are  now  suffered  to  grow  up  in  ignorance 
and  neglect. 

& 

In  the  fifth  place,  that  the  merely  knowing  how  to 
read  and  write  is  to  some  extent  a  preservative  from 
crime,  is  evident  from  the  State  prison  statistics  already 
given,  from  which  it  appears  that  if  all  in  the  State  were 
taught  to  read  and  write,  the  number  of  criminals  would 
be  diminished  nearly  ten  per  cent.  The  consequence 
would  be  a  great  pecuniary  saving;  though  one  can 


30  EDUCATION. 

hardly  bring  himself  to  mention  this  by  the  side  of  the 
immense  moral  gain. 

7.  "The  evil  complained  of  is  very  slight  in  the  rural 
portions  of  the  State." 

If  so,  then  all  the  other  objections,  for  this  case,  pro 
portionally  lose  their  weight;  then,  its  remedy  could 
interfere  but  little  with  personal  liberty  or  the  rights 
of  conscience;  it  could  subject  the  State  in  but  a  slight 
degree  to  the  charge  of  philanthropy;  it  could  cost 
but  little,  and  could  not  much  encourage  reckless 
marriages  or  extravagant  living,  nor  could  it  much 
increase  the  exposure  of  the  State  schools  to  the 
charge  of  immorality  and  ungodliness,  or  inutility 
and  impotence. 

The  remedy  is,  doubtless,  more  needed  in  cities  and 
crowded  communities  than  it  is  in  sparsely  settled  and 
agricultural  portions  of  the  country  ;  but  we  think  that 
we  have  shown  that  its  beneficial  influences  would  not 
be  confined  to  these  districts  of  dense  population,  but 
that  they  would  be  widespread  and  general,  and  that 
we  have  also  demonstrated  that  in  the  less  thickly  set 
tled  districts  it  is  not  impracticable,  nor  likely  to  work 
any  evil,  but  rather  that  it  will  be  productive  of  good 
and  only  good,  as  is  proved  by  the  experience  of  Prus 
sia  and  Sweden  and  Norway,  in  which  latter  country 
it  has  been  in  full  operation  for  more  than  forty  years. 

From  a  review,  therefore,  of  the  whole  case,  the 
board  cannot  but  earnestly  recommend  as  a  remedy 
for  this — one  of  the  greatest,  most  painful,  and  most 
threatening  evils  that  exist  among  us — the  enactment 
of  a  general  law  of  compulsory  education,  or  as  near  an 


EDUCATION.  31 

approximation  to  it  as  the  legislature,  in  its  wisdom, 
shall  deem  expedient  and  practicable  ;  any  necessary 
increase  of  expenditure  to  be  met  either  by  appropria 
tions  from  the  State  treasury  or  by  local  taxation,  or 
by  both. 

NOTE. 

Since  the  foregoing  was  written,  several  European 
countries,  such  as  England,  France,  Austria,  and  others, 
have  made  great  progress  towards  the  adoption  of  the 
principle  of  not  only  affording  a  certain  amount  of 
elementary  education  to  all  the  children  of  the  state, 
but  of  requiring  they  should  actually  receive  it. 

In  New  England,  compulsory  education  has  substan 
tially  existed  for  upwards  of  two  centuries,  under  the 
old  law  of  Massachusetts,  of  1642.  That  law  enacted 
that  "  Forasmuch  as  the  good  education  of  children 
is  of  singular  behoof  and  benefit  to  any  commonwealth, 
and  whereas,  many  parents  and  masters  are  too  in 
dulgent  and  negligent  of  their  duty  in  that  kind,  it 
is  ordered  that  the  chosen  men  appointed  for  managing 
the  prudential  affairs  in  the  several  precincts  and  quar 
ters  where  they  dwell  shall  have  a  vigilant  eye  over 
their  neighbors,  to  see,  first,  that  none  of  them  shall 
suffer  so  much  barbarism  in  any  of  their  families  as  not 
to  endeavor  to  teach  by  themselves  and  others  their 
children  and  apprentices  so  much  learning  as  may 
enable  them  to  read  perfectly  the  English  tongue,  and 
to  get  knowledge  of  the  capital  laws,  upon  penalty  of 
twenty  shillings  for  each  neglect  therein." 

It  was  in  the    exercise    of  this    same    authoritative 
parental  oversight  that  Massachusetts  again,  in  1836, 


32  EDUCATION. 

forbade  the  employment  of  children  under  fifteen  in 
factories,  unless  such  children  should  have  attended 
school  for  three  months  in  the  preceding  year.  Such 
an  ordinance  was  a  virtual  compulsion  of  attendance 
for  at  least  that  period  in  each  year,  on  the  part  of  all 
children  for  whom  employment  was  desired,  since 
without  the  attendance  the  employment  could  not 
lawfully  be  given.  The  provision,  slightly  modified, 
still  exists  in  that  State,  and  has  been  put  also  on  the 
statute  books  of  other  States. 

So  much  for  original  American  ideas  as  to  compul 
sion. 

Turning  to  laws  directly  compulsory,  we  go  a  little 
back  of  the  date  of  the  above  report,  in  1871,  to  make 
sure  of  giving  a  full  history  of  progress  in  this  direc 
tion. 

Vermont,  November  2ist,  1867,  passed,  and  Novem 
ber  23d,  1870,  amended,  a  law  requiring  every  child  of 
good  health  and  sound  mind,  between  eight  and  four 
teen  years  of  age,  to  attend  a  public  school  at  least 
three  months  in  each  year,  unless  otherwise  furnished 
with  the  means  of  education  for  a  like  period,  or  unless 
such  child  should  have  already  acquired  the  branches 
of  learning  usually  taught  in  public  schools.  No  child 
of  this  age  to  be  employed  in  mill  or  factory  without 
attendance  upon  school  for  three  months  of  the  year 
preceding.  Penalty,  in  either  case,  ten  dollars  to 
twenty  dollars. 

Michigan,  April  i5th,  1871,  passed  "  An  act  to  com 
pel  children  to  attend  school" — i.  e.,  all  of  good  health 
and  sound  mind,  between  eight  and  fourteen — for  at 
least  twelve  weeks  in  each  school  year,  of  which  at 


EDUCATION.  33 

least  six  weeks  must  be  consecutive.  Penalty  for  first 
offense,  five  dollars  to  ten  dollars  ;  for  subsequent  ones, 
ten  dollars  to  twenty  dollars. 

Texas,  April  24th,  of  the  same  year,  put  on  her 
statute  book  a  law  requiring  the  attendance  of  all  her 
scholastic  population  on  the  public  schools  of  their 
respective  districts  for  at  least  four  months  of  every 
year.  Penalty,  up  to  twenty-five  dollars.  The  law, 
however,  was  dropped  in  the  revision  of  1876. 

New  Hampshire,  July  i4th,  1871,  enacted  that  every 
person  having  charge  of  any  child  between  eight  and 
fourteen,  residing  in  a  district  where  a  public  school  is 
taught,  for  an  annual  period  of  twelve  weeks  or  more, 
within  two  miles  of  his  residence  by  the  nearest 
traveled  road,  must  cause  such  child  to  attend  such 
school  for  at  least  twelve  weeks  in  every  year,  six 
weeks  at  least  to  be  consecutive,  unless  excused  for 
reasons  specified.  Penalty  for  first  offense,  ten  dollars  ; 
for  any  subsequent  one,  twenty  dollars. 

Connecticut,  in  1872,  amended  her  truant  laws  of 
1865  and  1869,  authorizing  cities  and  towns  to  make 
all  needful  regulations  concerning-  truants  and  vagrant 

o  o  o 

children,  to  arrest  them  by  the  hands  of  the  police,  and 
to  commit  them,  after  a  third  arrest,  to  a  house  of 
correction  or  reformation  for  a  period  not  over  three 
years. 

Massachusetts,  also,  in  1873  and  1874,  amended  her 
truant  law,  making  it  require  every  person  having 
under  his  control  a  child  between  eight  and  fourteen, 
to  send  such  child  to  public  day-school  for  at  least 
twenty  weeks  in  each  year,  divided  into  two  terms 
of  ten  consecutive  weeks  each,  unless  the  child  has 


34  EDUCATION. 

attended  a  private  day-school  approved  by  the  school 
committee  for  a  like  period,  or  is  regularly  attending 
a  half-time  school  so  approved,  or  has  been  otherwise 
furnished  with  the  means  of  education  for  a  like 
period,  &c.,  &c.* 

Nevada,  February  25th,  1873,  passed  "An  act  to 
compel  children  to  attend  school," — ages  eight  to 
fourteen  ;  term  of  attendance  at  least  sixteen  weeks 
in  each  school  year,  eight  of  which  to  be  consecutive. 
Penalty  for  first  offense,  fifty  to  one  hundred  dollars  ; 
for  second,  &c.,  one  hundred  to  two  hundred  dollars. 

Kansas  moved  in  the  same  direction  in  1874,  by 
passing,  March  gth,  "An  act  requiring  the  education 
of  all  healthy  children  ; "  i.  e.,  all  between  eight  and 
fourteen  to  be  sent  to  school  for  at  least  twelve  weeks 
in  each  year,  six  of  which  must  be  consecutive.  Pen 
alty,  ten  to  twenty  dollars. 

New  Jersey  came  next,  with  a  law  passed  March 
27th,  1874,  and  amended  April  9th,  1875,  requiring 
parents  and  guardians  having  charge  of  children  be 
tween  eight  and  fourteen,  to  cause  them  to  attend 
some  school  at  least  twelve  weeks  in  each  year,  six  of 
which  must  be  consecutive  ;  or  to  be  instructed  at 
home  for  the  same  period  in  the  branches  commonly 
taught  in  the  public  schools,  unless  excused  for  cause. 
Penalty,  three  dollars  for  every  week  during  which, 
after  notice  from  the  district  clerk,  there  has  been  a 
failure  to  comply  with  the  provisions  of  the  law. 

California  followed  closely  after  New  Jersey,  pass 
ing,  March  28th,  1874,  "An  act  to  enforce  the  educa 
tional  rights  of  children."  All  between  eight  and 

*See  several  reports  of  the  Hon.  J.  D.  Philbrick,  of  Boston,  on  this  subject. 


EDUCATION.  35. 

fourteen  to  be  sent  to  a  public  school  two-thirds  of 
the  time  for  which  said  school  shall  be  taught  in  the 
place  of  the  children's  residence,  twelve  weeks  of  the 
time  to  be  consecutive,  unless  excused  by  the  school 
board  for  reasons  specified.  Penalty  for  first  offense, 
twenty  dollars ;  second  and  so  on,  twenty  to  fifty 
dollars. 

New  York,  May  nth  of  the  same  year  (1874), 
passed,  and  in  1876  amended,  an  act  with  almost 
as  pleasant  a  title  as  that  of  California,  calling  it  "An 
act  to  secure  to  children  the  benefits  of  elementary 
education."  Provisions  as  to  age,  eight  to  fourteen  ; 
term  of  attendance  for  each  year,  fourteen  weeks, 
eight  of  which  must  be  consecutive.  Alternative  of 
school  attendance,  instruction  at  home  for  at  least 
fourteen  weeks  each  year  in  spelling,  reading,  writing, 
English  grammar,  geography,  and  arithmetic.  None 
under  fourteen  to  be  employed  in  any  business  during 
the  school  hours  of  any  school  day  in  which  a  public 
school  is  taught  in  the  place  of  the  child's  residence. 
Penalty,  fifty  dollars. 

Laws  kindred  to  these  have  been  passed  in  Maine 
and  Arizona,  and  one  is  said  to  have  been  passed  re 
cently  in  Ohio.  But  as  copies  of  them  have  not  been 
yet  received,  the  precise  date  of  their  passage  and  the 
precise  conditions  they  impose  cannot  be  now  given.* 

Unfortunately,  it  must  be  acknowledged  that  the  suc 
cess  of  the  efforts  thus  made  to  secure  the  universal 
education  of  the  children  in  these  States  has  not,  in 
all  cases,  been  altogether  satisfactory ;  but  has  varied 

*  The  foregoing  statistics  have  just  been  obtained  from  the  Bureau  of  Educa 
tion,  at  Washington. 


36  EDUCATION. 

according  to  the  wisdom  and  thoroughness  of  the  le 
gal  provisions,  and  especially  according  to  the  stimulus 
afforded  by  popular  sympathy  to  their  energetic  and 
faithful  execution. 

It  is  to  be  particularly  regretted  that  Pennsylvania 
has  not  been  found  prepared  to  place  herself  among 
the  progressive  States  on  this  question.  A  better 
public  sentiment  among  us  needs  to  be  aroused, 
shaped,  and  concentrated,  before  we  can  have  a  com 
pulsory  law,  and  still  more,  before  such  a  law  can  be 
effectually  enforced.  The  popular  mind  must  be 
brought  to  a  clearer  apprehension  of  the  appalling 
magnitude  of  the  evil  which  such  a  law  alone  will  rem- 

o 

edy ;  to  a  clearer  apprehension  of  the  absolute  neces 
sity  of  universal  education  to  the  safety  and  perpetuity 
of  republican  institutions  based  upon  universal  suf 
frage.  The  suggestion  that  the  popular  mind  cannot 
be  so  trained,  is  the  suggestion  of  apathy  or  of  des 
peration.  The  stale  objection  that  compulsory  educa 
tion  is  inconsistent  with  democratic  or  republican  or 
American  ideas,  is  a  mere  prejudice  or  a  downright 
impertinence.  It  is  to  be  presumed  that  democratic, 
republican,  and  American  ideas  are  not  suicidal ;  are 
not  inconsistent  with  what  can  be  shown  to  be  re 
quired  by  the  public  good  and  the  very  safety  of  the 
Commonwealth  ;  and  so  the  only  proper  and  perti 
nent  question  in  this  case  is,  whether  compulsory  edu- 
icaton  is  so  required.  But  is  it  verily  a  democratic  and 
American  idea  that,  while  universal  popular  education 
may  be  a  good  thing  in  a  monarchy  or  despotism,  there 
is  no  need  of  it  in  a  free  State  ?  Besides,  there  is  a 
class  of  men  in  society  who  should  remember  that  it  is 


EDUCATION.  37 

their  office  to  bestir  themselves  to  lead  public  senti 
ment,  instead  of  being  idly  and  passively  led  by  it.  If 
the  efforts  of  the  Board  of  Public  Charities  on  this  sub 
ject  had  been  zealously  seconded  by  other  parties  who 
have  had  it  in  their  power  to  exert  an  effective  if  not 
a  controlling  influence  in  the  case ;  if  they  had  exerted 
such  an  influence  in  accordance  with  their  own  personal 
convictions  of  what  was  demanded  by  the  public  good  ; 
if  they  had  boldly  and  manfully  stemmed  the  opposing 
current  of  misguided  popular  prejudice ;  it  is  confi 
dently  believed  that,  before  this  time,  public  sentiment 
in  Pennsylvania  would  have  been  brought  to  such  a 
pitch  that  we  should  not  only  have  a  law  of  compulsory 
education  upon  our  statute  book,  but  such  a  law  carried 
into  actual,  thorough,  and  beneficent  execution. 


SCHOOLS   OF   REFORM. 

DESTITUTE  AND  DELINQUENT  CHILDREN. 

In  the  annual  report  of  this  board  for  1871,  we  en 
deavored  to  show  that  vice  and  crime  were  largely  the 
offspring  of  ignorance,  and  we  recommended  a  system 
of  universal  education,  which  would  certainly  embrace 
those  classes  of  the  youth  of  the  State  who  were  most 
exposed,  through  the  far-reaching  influences  of  "  illit 
eracy,"  to  a  violation  of  law  and  order ;  and  in  our 
report  for  the  following  year,  we  reiterated  the  same 
view,  and  have  shown  by  reliable  statistics,  First,  that 
one-third  of  all  prisoners  are  totally  uneducated,  and 
four-fifths  are  practically  uneducated ;  and  Second,  that 


3$  EDUCATION. 

the  proportion  of  prisoners  from  the  illiterate  classes 
is  at  least  ten-fold  as  great  as  the  proportion  of  those 
having  some  education.  This  is  no  longer  an  idea 
or  speculation  ;  it  is  a  well-recognized  truth,  and  has 
been  so  accepted  by  the  more  cautious  and  reflecting 
communities,  both  at  home  and  abroad.  Prussia  has 
acted  upon  it  with  the  most  marked  and  beneficial 
results,  and  has  been  emulated  by  other  continental 
powers,  as  we  have  already  shown.  The  statesmen 
of  France  are  co-laborers  with  her  philanthropists  in 
the  endeavor  to  solve  the  problem  of  their  nation's 
fluctuating  political  embarrassments,  and  believe  they 
will  find  its  solution  in  the  state's  neglect  of  the 
education  of  the  people.  They  find  unquestionably 
there  that  the  crime  of  the  country  is  largely  the 
result  of  ignorance  and  mental  impotence,  and  this 
fact  is  most  strikingly  confirmed  by  the  following 
statement  of  the  illiteracy  which  prevailed  in  the 
French  prisons  in  the  years  1867  to  1869,  given  in 
the  report  of  the  International  Penitentiary  Con 
gress  :— 

Whole  number  of  arrests, 444,133 

Number  unable  to  read, 442,194 

Or  95.63  per  cent. 

Whole  number  of  convicts, 18,643 

Number  unable  to  read, 16,015 

Or  87.28  per  cent. 

Average  number  of  juvenile  prisoners, 8,139 

Number  unable  to  read, 6,607 

Or  81.14  per  cent. 

In  Great   Britain  no  measure  of  public  policy  is  so 
much  relied  on  for  the  elevation  and  amelioration  of 


EDUCATION.  39 

the  condition  of  the  people,  and  the  firm  prosperity 
of  the  state,  as  common-school  education.  It  has 
been  well  said,  that  "  education  is  a  force  restraining 
vice  and  crime."  Where  it  is  purely  intellectual,  it 
restrains  by  teaching  the  truth  that  "  honesty  is  the 
best  policy."  Where  it  rises  to  the  dignity  of  a  Chris 
tian  education,  it  includes,  also,  the  higher  restraint  of 
the  conscience.  It  may  be  safely  stated  as  an  irre 
futable  proposition,  that  the  state  which  neglects  the 
education  of  her  youth,  prepares  them  for  vicious, 
degraded,  and  criminal  lives,  which  are  spent  in  dep 
redating  upon  society,  and  in  infecting  by  example, 
by  contaminating  and  debasing  influence,  the  lives  of 
others,  which  would  otherwise  prove  exemplary  and 
useful. 

The  United  States  Commissioner  of  Education  pre 
sents  the  following  results  of  an  examination  of  the 
statistics  of  pauperism  in  the  three  States  of  Pennsyl 
vania,  Ohio,  and  Illinois, — States  not  inferior  to  any  in 
popular  education.  Take  one  million  of  persons  from 
the  population  of  these  three  States,  in  numbers  pro 
portioned  to  their  population  respectively,  and  the 
conclusion  will  be  nearly  as  follows : — 


Population, 1,000,000 

Paupers, 8,000 

Illiterate  paupers  (totally), 45,000 

Illiterate  paupers, 4,800 

Thus  of  the  whole  population,  there  are  illiterate 
between  four  and  five  per  cent. ;  of  paupers,  illiterate, 
sixty  per  cent.  These  results  clearly  demonstrate  that 


40  EDUCATION. 

the  want  of  education  is  the  want  of  facilities  to  ac 
quire  employments,  and  to  work  profitably  in  them. 

The  evil,  therefore,  which  society  suffers  from  illiter 
acy  in  its  relation  to  crime  and  pauperism,  has  not  been 
exaggerated  in  our  reports,  and  its  influence  upon  com 
mon  labor  is  not  less  prejudicial,  and  presents  the  most 
surprising  and  suggestive  lesson.  This  is  so  well  pre 
sented  by  Dr.  Edward  Jarvis  in  his  contribution  to  the 
recent  report  of  the  National  Bureau  of  Education,  that 
we  shall  adopt  his  clear  statements  and  their  practical 
application  to  almost  every  department  of  industry. 

Dr.  Jarvis  says: — "Beyond  the  mere  knowledge  of 
facts  and  principles,  there  are  other  advantages  equally 
important  and  valuable,  that  grow  out  of  the  process 
of  study  and  acquisition.  The  training  and  discipline 
of  the  school  quicken  and  energize  the  mind,  and 
give  it  a  facility  of  applying  itself  and  its  varied  facul 
ties  to  manifold  purposes." 

"  Thus  boys  and  girls  who  are  educated  and  trained 
to  reflect  by  the  studies  of  the  school,  carry  their  power 
and  habit  of  mental  action  with  them  to  whatever  pur 
suit  they  may  address  themselves.  In  the  various 
employments  of  their  maturer  life,  whether  they  are 
laborers,  farmers,  mechanics,  or  workers  in  any  other 
sphere,  whatever  may  be  the  material  on  which  they 
operate,  whatever  may  be  the  transformation  they  may 
desire  to  effect,  or  results  they  may  attempt  to  produce, 
they  enlist  the  co-operation  of  their  sharpened  percep 
tions  and  disciplined  reason  in  the  plan  and  perform 
ance  of  their  undertakings." 

"  Muscular  force  alone  is  not  sufficient  to  fulfill  the 
just  demands  of  labor.  It  needs  to  be  directed  and 


EDUCATION.  41 

measured,  so  that  a  blow  shall  be  given,  aimed  aright 
in  the  proper  direction,  reach  the  intended  point,  and 
produce  the  desired  effect.  The  hammer  must  hit  the 
head  of  the  nail,  the  axe  the  place  where  the  wood  is 
to  be  divided.  The  blow  must  not  be  so  strong  as  to 
crush  and  injure,  nor  so  weak  as  to  fail  of  effect  and 
be  lost."  These  principles  are  applied  in  an  analysis 
of  various  processes  of  labor,  from  the  sawing  of  wood 
and  the  weaving  of  cloth  to  the  most  delicate  opera 
tions  of  the  skilled  mechanic  and  the  plain  artist ;  and 
the  conclusion  is  reached,  that  education  is  the  econo 
my  of  force,  and  gives  it  a  greater  power  to  create 
value.  It  creates  skillfulness  which  has  the  ability  to 
add  to  the  value  of  material,  which  cannot  be  attained 
by  ignorance. 

"  The  cost  of  educating  a  laborer — of  setting  him 
to  think  and  fitting  him  to  expend  his  forces  to  advan 
tage — is  very  small.  The  few  years  of  youth,  when  the 
body  is  comparatively  weak,  the  expense  of  teachers, 
books,  &c.,  are  but  small  expenditures  compared  with 
the  gain.  The  return  in  increased  productive  power 
is  great  and  permanent.  It  is  the  difference  between 
the  large  and  certain  and  the  small  and  uncertain 
produce." 

It  is  clear,  then,  that  the  interests  of  the  State  are 
promoted  by  the  education  of  the  people,  and  that  no 
class  can  be  safely  excluded  from  its  beneficial  influ 
ences.  But  are  the  provisions  which  the  legislature 
has  heretofore  made,  or  will  be  allowed  to  make  under 
the  amended  Constitution,  sufficiently  comprehensive 
to  embrace  all  ranks  and  conditions,  or  rather,  will  not 
those  who  most  need  the  wholesome  discipline  and  the 


42  EDUCATION. 

enabling    influences    of  education    be    practically    ex 
cluded  ? 

The  meeting  of  the  Constitutional  Convention  during 
the  past  year,  has  been  an  occasion  of  especial  interest 
to  this  board ;  for  wise  and  prudent  as  are  many  of 
the  measures  it  has  offered  in  amendment  of  the  late 
Constitution,  it  has,  we  think,  greatly  embarrassed  a 
question,  in  whose  solution  lies  one  of  the  highest 
interest  to  every  community,  and  of  the  State  herself, 
in  a  most  eminent  degree. 

We  refer  to  certain  provisions  which  passed  that 
body,  restrictive  upon  the  education  of  the  poor  chil 
dren  of  the  State.  While  the  animus  of  the  Convention 
seemed  more  favorable  to  universal  education,  and 
some  of  its  acts  afford  a  larger  opportunity  for  certain 
classes  of  youth  of  the  Commonwealth  to  enjoy  more 
securely,  and  perhaps  more  largely  than  in  the  past, 
the  advantages  of  education,  it  practically  overturned 
both  the  injunction  and  spirit  of  the  late  Constitution,  in 
curtailing  the  rights  of  the  poor  to  the  enjoyment  of 
State  aid  in  their  education  ;  and  in  positively  forbid 
ding  it  on  the  part  of  the  several  municipalities  of  the 
Commonwealth  in  combination  with  the  aid  of  any 
private  agency.  The  education  of  the  most  ignorant 
of  the  children  of  the  State  has  been  practically  cut 
off,  unless  a  more  liberal  action  on  the  part  of  the 
legislature  shall  counteract  the  ill  effects  of  the  constitu 
tional  provision  in  this  behalf. 

If  education  is  needed,  it  is  needed  by  the  illiterate. 
It  was  the  prime  object  of  the  convention  which  framed 
the  late  constitution  to  provide  an  education  for  the  poor 
gratis.  The  well-to-do  will  effect  this  in  some  respect- 


EDUCATION.  43 

able  manner,  whether  the  State  helps  them  or  not. 
But  the  destitute  child  of  the  State  cannot  obtain  it 
without  the  State's  aid,  or  the  aid  of  the  particular 
municipality  which  owns  it.  Such  child  is  most  sig 
nificantly  a  ward,  and  to  the  ward  of  the  State  or  the 
municipality,  as  the  case  may  variously  be  considered, 
has  'the  convention  denied  all  practical  relief  from  the 
evils  of  ignorance.  We  say,  "  practical  relief,"  for  that 
relief  cannot  be  given  effectually  without  combining  with 
the  provision  made  by  the  public  the  aid  of  private 
efforts  and  private  benefactions.  This,  the  nature  of 
the  case,  and  all  experience,  combine  to  demonstrate. 

This  board  took  an  early  interest  in  this  matter  as  it 
came  before  the  convention,  and  we  are  entirely  con 
vinced  that  its  action  in  relation  to  it  was  caused  by  an 
inadequate  consideration  of  the  subject. 

The  idea  that  "charity"  must  attend  upon  any  pro 
ceeding  or  device  to  draw  the  destitute  and  neglected 
children  of  the  State  out  of  the  abyss  of  ignorance, 
and  consequently  of  uselessness,  and  of  vice  and  crime, 
for  which  they  furnish  the  main  material,  seemed  to  be 
the  effectual  motive  in  inducing  the  passage  of  the 
restrictive  measures  referred  to.  By  the  provision  of 
section  seventh  of  the  article  on  taxation  and  finance, 
municipalities  are  forbidden  to  appropriate  money  for 
any  corporation,  association,  institution,  or  individual. 
None  of  the  cities  or  counties  of  the  State  may  aid 
private  effort  in  the  rescue  and  amendment  and  in 
struction  of  the  debased  and  ignorant  and  vagra'nt 
children  within  their  borders ;  and  they  are  precluded, 
also,  by  the  same  provision,  from  contributing  to  the 
education  of  the  blind  and  the  deaf  mute  and  the 


44  EDUCATION. 

imbecile ;  or  to  appropriate  money  to  the  houses  of 
refuge  or  schools  of  reform,  because  they  are  private 
corporations.  This  is  the  plain  and  obvious  con 
struction  of  the  section  referred  to. 

By  section  eighteen  of  the  article  on  "  legislation," 
the  legislature  is  forbidden  to  make  any  State  grant  to 
any  charitable  or  educational  institution  conducted  by 
religious  bodies,  and  by  section  seventeenth  it  is  for 
bidden  to  aid  any  charitable  and  educational  work  con 
ducted  in  any  institution  which  is  not  "  absolutely 
under  State  control,"  excepting  by  a  vote  of  two- 
thirds  of  all  the  members  elected  to  the  legislature ;  so 
that  in  case  of  every  grant  to  either  of  what  are  called 
the  State  institutions,  excepting  the  two  penitentiaries 
and  the  hospitals  for  the  insane  at  Harrisburg  and 
Danville,  an  overwhelming  majority  must  always  be 
secured  in  order  to  obtain  support  to  the  institutions, 
or  for  their  extension,  if  desirable.  And,  as  respects 
the  destitute  and  orphan  children  of  the  Common 
wealth,  a  like  restriction  is  placed  upon  the  State's 
affording  aid  in  their  education,  although  private  benefi 
cence  may  be  offered  to  feed  and  clothe  them,  while 
pursuing  an  educational  and  industrial  training.  Is  it 
probable  that  the  State  will  expend  the  millions  of 
money  necessary  to  purchase  these  "  private  corpora 
tions,"  or  establish  State  schools  for  vagrant  children  ? 
Or,  even  if  she  should  do  so,  would  she  not  fail  in  their 
administration  ?  Has  it  ever  occurred  that  the  defect 
ive  classes  were  effectually  benefited,  without  the 
co-operation  of  that  warm  humanity  which  stimulates 
private  zeal  and  benevolence  ? 

The   subject  of  the    training  and  education  of  the 


EDUCATION.  45 

destitute  and  neglected  children  of  the  State  has  been 
presented  to  the  legislature  very  fully  in  our  previous 
reports. 

Its  importance  is  not  less  grave  than  that  of  the  most 
momentous  questions  of  state  concern,  which  can  en 
gage  your  attention.  There  is  absolutely  no  provision 
made  for  the  "education"  of  this  class  by  the  legisla 
ture  or  by  any  municipality  within  the  bounds  of  the 
Commonwealth.  The  almshouses  are  of  course  open 
to  them,  and  such  education  as  is  found  in  them,  but 
they  would  go  there  only  by  constraint,  and  neither 
themselves  nor  the  community  would  be  the  gainers  by 
their  residence  in  such  refuges.  Still  the  fact  that  the 
various  municipalities  of  the  State  make  certain  provi 
sion  for  the  needs  of  their  indigent  population,  is  an 
argument  with  many  legislators,  that  the  State  is  not 
called  upon  to  provide  for  the  education  of  this  desti 
tute  class  of  the  youth  of  the  Commonwealth,  who  can 
never  avail  themselves  of  her  legislation  and  her  bounty 
in  behalf  of  universal  education.  That  this  class  of 
children  is  not  reached  by  the  public  schools  is  undeni 
able.  It  is  manifest  wherever  free  schools  exist,  and 
wherever  even  "compulsory  education"  obtains.  The 
Prussian  system,  it  is  true,  has  become  so  thoroughly 
established  by  long  usage,  and  its  influences  have  so 
permeated  all  ranks  and  conditions  of  the  people,  that 
it  has  made  the  most  salutary  inroads  upon  the  habits 
of  the  debased  and  vagrant  population  of  youth,  and 
larpfe  accessions  of  this  low  element  have  in  a  course 

o 

of  years  become  prepared  for  reception  into  the  com 
mon  schools.  In  England  the  elementary  education 
act  of  1870,  which  is  of  a  compulsory  character,  has 


46  EDUCATION. 

been  found  entirely  ineffective  in  reaching  the  destitute 
children  of  the  land.  Like  the  blind  and  the  deaf  mute, 
they  remain  "  outside '"  because  of  some  deficiency, 
which  is  as  despotic  and  restraining  as  the  want  of 
speech  or  sight  is  to  the  former. 

It  is  the  deficiency  of  home  care  and  guardianship, 
and  for  this  they  are  no  more  responsible  than  are 
other  defectives.  To  this  class  they  belong.  They  are 
of  the  "  unfortunates  "  of  the  State,  wherever  the  State 
exists,  in  Europe  or  America,  in  New  York,  New  Eng 
land,  or  Pennsylvania ;  and  they  must  have  some  kind 
of  substitution  for  the  lost  parent  or  the  abandoned 
parent  or  the  degraded  parent,  as  the  raised  letter 
must  be  resorted  to  in  the  instruction  of  the  blind,  and 
the  manual  alphabet  for  the  deaf  mute,  in  order  to 
make  it  possible  for  them  to  receive  the  benefit  of 
school  education.  Thus  their  destitution  may  be  cared 
for  by  private  benevolence,  and  thus  they  may  be  pre 
pared  to  receive  from  the  State  the  educational  advan 
tages  which  more  favored  youth  obtain  without  such 
supplementary  aid. 

If  private  bounty  will  feed  and  clothe  them,  shall  not 
the  State  aid  in  their  education  ?  If  the  poor  should 
be  taught  gratis,  shall  these,  the  poorest  of  the  poor, 
be  excluded  ?  If  neither  private  bounty  nor  public  aid 
relieve  them,  they  must  beg  or  steal  or  do  some  uncer 
tain  or  degrading  work,  in  order  to  obtain  the  food 
whereby  to  live  and  the  clothing  to  cover  their  naked 
ness,  for  they  must  be  fed  and  clothed,  however  meanly, 
whether  they  are  taught  or  not.  Must  they  starve  or 
go  naked  in  order  that  they  may  avail  themselves  of 
the  educational  provisions  of  the  law  ?  We  say  em- 


EDUCATION.  47 

phatically,  No  !  and  take  the  ground  that  where  this 
want  of  parental  guardianship  is  supplied  by  private 
effort  and  private  benevolence,  the  State  should  do  her 
part  in  their  educational  work,  by  making  moderate 
per  capita  allowances  to  schools  or  homes  established 
by  private  and  philanthropic  enterprise,  wherever  they 
are  needed,  for  the  industrial  training  and  education  of 
the  class  referred  to.  The  State  should,  as  a  matter  of 
course,  exercise  a  right  of  inspection,  and  see  that  the 
money  she  grants  is  not  squandered  or  misapplied,  and 
should  reserve  the  power  of  revoking  its  sanction  and 
withholding  its  aid,  whenever  she  judges  that  there  is 
occasion  for  such  course. 

This  fundamental  evil,  which,  if  not  met  and  over 
come,  will  render  abortive  all  attempts  at  an  appreci 
able  reduction  of  crime  and  pauperism,  and  all  efforts 
towards  an  increasing  and  healthy  amendment  of  the 
morals  of  the  lower  classes,  has  been  appreciated  in 
many  of  our  American  communities,  and  in  countries 
where  the  necessity  is  less  paramount  than  it  is  in  a 
democratic  land.  The  system  above  recommended  for 
its  abatement  and  suppression  has  received  in  England 
a  recognized  status  from  the  government,  and  the 
schools  established  by  it  are  aided  by  government 
grants,  and  are  practically  employed  as  a  part  of  the 
machinery  of  the  educational  work  of  the  state.  By 
this  course  of  procedure  (which,  it  is  true,  was  long 
denied  by  the  authorities  and  adopted  only  after  it  had 
been  commended  to  their  favor  by  the  surest  evidences 
of  its  efficiency  in  aiding  the  government  to  fulfill  its 
desire  and  its  duty),  it  was  made  manifest  at  the  late 
International  Congress,  by  indisputable  testimony, 


48  EDUCATION. 

namely,  by  authenticated  returns  from  prisons  and 
reformatories,  that  the  condition  of  the  whole  juvenile 
population  of  England  has  been  changed  ;  and,  in  the 
language  of  a  distinguished  member  of  that  body,  "the 
system  has  cut  up  juvenile  vagrancy  by  the  roots,  and 
has  almost  destroyed  juvenile  crime  in  many  localities." 
It  surely  cannot  be  said  that  in  such  a  work  as  that 
referred  to,  the  utilization  of  private  benevolence  and 
economy  for  the  public  good,  in  the  manner  suggested, 
need  compromise  any  doctrine  or  principle  of  any  citi 
zen  or  any  party  in  the  State,  or  excite  the  antagonism 
of  any  person  or  community  whatever.  But,  looking 
from  the  standpoint  from  which  this  board  is  bound  to 
survey  the  subject,  namely,  in  its  relations  to  human 
degradation,  pauperism,  and  crime,  it  is  believed  that 
great  danger  is  threatened  to  the  State,  in  denying 
opportunites  of  education  and  improvement  to  the 
neglected  classes  of  her  children,  and  that  a  wrong  is 
inflicted  upon  them  and  will  be  perpetuated  until  full 
and  practical  legislation  is  effected  to  rescue  them  from 
the  fetters  which  restrain  their  mental  and  moral 
improvement.  Charity  is  not  involved  at  all  in  the 
measure  proposed  to  your  honorable  bodies.  It  is  only 
a  right  which  is  commended  to  your  protection  and 
vindication. 

In  a  communication  to  your  honorable  bodies,  made 
last  year,  which  accompanied  our  report  on  the  appli 
cations  for  State  aid,  we  proposed  to  submit  a  scheme 
to  the  present  legislature,  which  should  present  a  uni 
form  system  of  State  policy  and  State  aid  to  a  class  of 
institutions  which  might  be  beneficially  encouraged  by 
moderate  per  capita  grants  towards  the  education  of 


EDUCATION.  49 

the  class  of  children  who  should  be  received  into 
them. 

This  subject  has  been  thoughtfully  considered  by  us, 
in  the  interval,  and  we  have  exhausted,  as  we  believe, 
the  field  of  investigation  and  of  thought,  which  is  at 
tainable.  We  have  reached  the  conclusion,  which  we 
have  set  forth  and  recommended  in  this  report,  and 
present  a  scheme  to  your  honorable  bodies,  of  an  im 
partial  and  general  character,  which  is  intended  simply 
to  place  a  class  of  children,  whose  condition  needs  the 
strengthening  and  ameliorating  influences  of  education 
more  than  that  of  any  other  class,  upon  a  like,  though 
by  no  means  an  equal,  footing  with  the  less  dependent 
children  of  the  State. 

We  perfectly  understand  that  it  will  require  a  fuller 
vote  to  accomplish  the  aid  we  seek  for  these  abandoned 
children,  but  we  trust  that  the  apparent  disfavor  which 
the  Constitutional  Convention  has  seemed  to  cast  upon 
this  just  and  rightful  work,  will  not  be  responded  to  by 
your  honorable  bodies,  but  will  rather  stimulate  you  to 
more  earnest  desire  and  effort  to  do  justice  to  those 
whose  neglect  will  assuredly  be  avenged  upon  the 
honor,  the  purity,  and  also  the  material  wealth  of  the 
community. 

The  board  submitted  a  memorial  on  this  subject  to 
the  convention,  while  in  session,  and  by  resolution 
ordered  it  to  be  incorporated  in  this  report,  as  com 
pletely  expressing  their  views,  and  sustaining  them  by 
arguments,  which  they  think  should  have  been  conclu 
sive  with  the  convention.  The  following  letters  from 
Mary  Carpenter,  the  noble  gentlewoman  and  distin 
guished  philanthropist,  and  from  Dr.  Wines,  well 


50  EDUCATION. 

known  for  his  labors  in  measures  for  the  prevention  of 
crime;  who,  expert  themselves  in  questions  of  reforma 
tory  discipline,  have  also  witnessed  the  practical  opera 
tion  and  have  seen  the  demonstrated  results  of  such  a 
scheme  for  the  education  of  neglected  and  abandoned 
children  as  we  now  recommend;  give  unsolicited  ex 
pression  to  the  views  of  strangers  to  our  borders ; 
views  which  we  happen  to  know  are  fully  endorsed  by 
many  statesmen  and  philanthropists,  who  have  known 
of  the  efforts  of  the  Board  of  Public  Charities  in  favor 
of  the  measure  of  public  policy  proposed.  The  letters 
are  as  follows  : — 

Geo.  L.  Harrison,  Esq., 

President  of  the  Board  of  State  Charities, 

MY  DEAR  SIR  : — I  thank  you  most  sincerely  for  the 
copy  of  your  memorial  in  behalf  of  the  education  of 
neglected  and  destitute  children,  lately  submitted  to  the 
Constitutional  Convention  of  Pennsylvania.  I  cannot 
but  hope  that  an  argument  so  cogent,  so  thoroughly 
unanswerable  indeed,  as  your  paper  embodies,  will 
have  its  effect  upon  the  enlightened  body  to  which  it  is 
addressed.  It  is  only  to-day  that  I  received  a  letter 
from  Mr.  E.  Carleton  Tuffnell,  inspector  of  the  *pauper 
schools  of  England,  in  which  he  speaks  of  the  excel 
lent  fruits  of  these  institutions. 

Among  other  things,  he  says,  "  there  are  in  the 
pauper  schools  of  London  alone  eight  thousand  chil 
dren,  all  of  the  lowest  class,  who,  under  the  system 
now  pursued,  are  not  only  saved  from  a  life  of  vice  and 

*  One  branch  of  the  system  of  industrial  schools  of  Great  Britain. 


EDUCATION.  51 

crime,  but  turn  out  among  the  most  valuable  and  pro 
ductive  members  of  society."  These  schools  are  all 
strictly  industrial,  and  under  the  supervision  of  the 
"  local  government  board."  To  me  it  seems  the  most 
natural  thing  in  the  world  that  your  Constitutional  Con 
vention  should  not  only  encourage  but  welcome  the 
co-operation,  and  especially  the  initiative  of  private  be 
nevolence,  in  the  work  of  removing  from  the  body 
politic  the  terrible  plague-spot  which  you  have  so 
clearly  and  forcibly  called  to  its  notice  and  recom 
mended  to  its  consideration.  If  the  convention  fail  to 
take  the  action  recommended  by  your  board,  or  some 
action  equivalent,  such  failure  can,  it  seems  to  me,  be 
attributed  only  to  the  want  of  a  thorough  grasp  and 
comprehension  of  the  question.  It  is  really  a  question 
of  the  healthy  and  vigorous  action,  if  not  indeed  in  the 
end  of  the  very  existence,  of  republican  institutions. 
The  instinct  of  self-preservation,  it  would  seem,  should 
lead  the  convention  in  the  direction  indicated  by  your 
memorial. 

That  God  may  help  you  in  this  work  is  the  wish  and 
prayer  of 

Yours,  truly  and  faithfully, 

E.  C.  WINES. 

320  BROADWAY,  NEW  YORK,  October  2Oth,  1873. 


RED  LODGE  HOUSE, 
BRISTOL,  ENGLAND,  November  ryth,  1873. 

Geo.  L.  Harrison,  Esq.,  President,  &c., 

DEAR  SIR  : — I  have  just  completed  the  perusal  of 
the  very  important  documents  which  you  have  just  sent 


52  EDUCATION. 

me,  respecting  the  course  taken  by  the  convention, 
concerning  neglected  and  destitute  children.  I  am 
perfectly  astonished  at  the  retrograde  proceedings 
adopted  by  that  body,  in  obstructing  or  almost  pre 
venting  the  past  course  of  voluntary  benevolence,  and 
absolutely  ignoring  the  just  claims  of  the  children  of 
your  Commonwealth,  every  one  of  whom  has  an  abso 
lute  right  to  justice  and  equal  advantage  with  every 
other.  Your  arguments  are  admirably  developed ; 
they  are  virtually  the  same  as  those  which  we  have 
been  bringing  before  the  Committee  of  Council  on 
Education  for  a  quarter  of  a  century,  with  respect  to 
the  same  neglected  class  ;  and  our  appeal  has  not  been 
unheeded. 

I  trust  that  you  will  rouse  public  opinion  to  support 
you.  It  will  be  a  great  misfortune  to  your  State  to 
pass  laws  so  contrary  to  the  spirit  of  the  age.  I  re 
joice  to  see  the  tone  of  the  public  press,  and  hope  you 
will  kindly  keep  me  informed  of  progress. 

Respectfully,  yours, 

MARY  CARPENTER. 

There  are  two  classes  of  these  vagrant  and  aban 
doned  children  which  demand  the  educational  care  and 
training  claimed  for  them;  otherwise  they  become  the 
enemies  of  order  and  good  government.  One  of  these 
classes  is  perpetually  replenished  from  the  other,  as  it, 
in  turn,  swells  the  ranks  of  maturer  vice  and  crime. 
Those  who  have  absolutely  fallen  into  crime  may  be 
suitably  provided  for  in  our  houses  of  refuge,  especi 
ally  if  they  be  made  less  like  juvenile  jails,  and  be 


EDUCATION.  53 

administered  by  a  less  repressive  and  penal  system  of 
government.  But  amongst  these  criminal  youth,  many 
of  them  graduates  in  wickedness,  there  are  numbers 
whose  faults  are  slight  and  venial,  and  whose  trans 
gressions  have  occurred  solely  through  parental  neglect 
or  orphanage,  and  multitudes  of  these  throng  the  alleys 
and  courts  and  streets  of  all  our  larger  communities, 
and  become  tenants,  at  length,  of  the  hospitals  and 
poor-houses  and  jails  of  every  portion  of  the  State. 
This  is  the  class  of  children  which  is  not  reached  by 
the  State  provision  for  universal  education,  and  which 
that  system  never  will  or  can  reach.  They  do  not 
need  the  exacting  and  constraining  discipline  which  is 
necessary  in  houses  of  refuge,  but  they  need  to  be 
touched  and  impressed  by  a  guardianship  assimilated 
to  proper  home  training,  and  strengthened  by  the 
discipline  of  school  and  industrial  education  to  resist 
temptations  and  learn  to  realize  the  enjoyment  of 
earning  a  support  by  honorable  employments. 

The  system  which  has  been  successfully  adopted  in 
Great  Britain  has  proved  itself  adequate  to  this  end. 
It  is  the  system  of  day  industrial  schools,  into  which 
certain  classes  of  children  are  received,  either  volun 
tarily  or  by  commitment,  if  they  will  not  or  cannot 
attend  the  ordinary  elementary  schools.  These  classes 
embrace,  first,  children  found  begging,  receiving  alms 
habitually,  living  in  the  streets  or  about  public  places ; 
second,  those  found  in  vagrancy  having  no  home,  nor 
fixed  dwelling-place,  nor  guardianship ;  third,  the  des 
titute,  either  who  are  orphans  or  whose  surviving  parent 
is  in  prison,  or  wrho  will  not  submit  to  parental  or 
other  authority;  fourth,  children  under  twelve  years  of 


54  EDUCATION. 

age,  accused  of  crime,  but  who  have  never  been  con 
victed  of  a  felony. 

These  schools  are  all  conducted  on  the  family 
system,  and  are  in  all  respects  schools  and  do  not  at 
all  resemble  penal  establishments.  They  give  element 
ary  instruction  and  industrial  training,  the  object  being 
to  provide  for  the  children  an  education  which  will 
enable  them  to  earn  for  themselves  a  living,  and 
become  useful  members  of  society.  The  school  boards 
have  power  to  establish  these  day  industrial  schools, 
and  to  certify  them  as  fit  and  proper,  when  established 
by  voluntary  effort,  and  also  to  make  certain  per  capita 
allowances  to  the  managers.  The  English  law  has 
decided  that  education  should  be  compulsory,  but  not 
in  all  cases  gratuitous,  and  power  is  given  to  recover 
from  the  parent,  when  he  can  afford  it,  the  whole  or 
part  of  the  cost  of  the  education  of  the  child ;  and 
from  the  guardians  of  the  poor  the  whole  expense  of 
food  and  education,  if  the  child  is  chargeable.  The 
religious  question  is  not  involved  at  all  in  the  case  of 
these  schools.  Where  the  entrance  is  voluntary  they 
can  choose  the  schools  conducted  by  managers  of 
their  own  religious  creed ;  and  when  sent  by  the 
magistrates  the  child's  "  religion  "  is  first  ascertained, 
and  he  is  sent  to  a  school  of  the  same  persuasion. 

Such  is  the  outline  of  the  British  method  of  accom 
plishing  the  education  and  industrial  training  of  the 
neglected  and  destitute  children,  and,  as  already  shown, 
it  has  been  eminently  successful.  We  recommend  the 
adoption  of  a  similar  system  for  this  Commonwealth. 
We  shall  not  err  in  following  any  good  example.  It 
would  be  folly  to  reject  a  scheme  because  it  has  been 


EDUCATION.  55 

projected  and  carried  to  success  by  strangers.  We 
therefore  ask  legislation  which  shall  establish  a  plan, 
kindred  to  what  we  have  described,  for  the  education 
and  industrial  training  of  our  own  vagrant  and  aban 
doned  children,  which  shall  prove  effectual  in  prevent 
ing  the  crime  and  the  pauperism  that  result  from 
ignorance  and  idleness.  As  the  maintenance  of  a 
convict  costs,  upon  an  average,  $200  a  year,  and  as 
he  generally  remains  a  criminal,  it  is  clearly  the  part 
of  true  wisdom  to  adopt  the  more  economical  method 
of  a  preventive  measure,  which  will  save  the  State's 
money,  and  reduce  its  proportion  of  crime. 

At  the  session  of  the  British  Local  Science  Asso 
ciation,  recently  convened  in  England,  Miss  Carpenter 
proposed  the  subject,  "  How  can  education  be  brought 
to  bear  on  the  hitherto  untouched  portion  of  the 
population."  It  was  demonstrated  that  notwithstand 
ing  all  the  provisions  made  by  the  government  and  by 
private  individuals,  interested  for  the  protection  and 
education  of  young  offenders  and  destitute  children  in 
reformatories,  in  certified  industrial  schools  (which  are 
private  reformatories,  accepted  as  such  by  the  govern 
ment),  and  in  workhouse  schools,  a  large  residuum 
remained,  who  are  untouched  by  any  educational  insti 
tutions,  and  who  furnish  a  constant  supply  to  these 
expensive  boarding-schools.  These  neglected  children 
still  remained,  although  the  school  board  had  for  three 
years  endeavored  to  reach  all.  Such  has  been  our 
own  experience.  It  is  clear  and  indisputable,  then,  that 
a  fresh  agency  is  needed.  These  children  are  half- 
civilized  and  half-fed.  They  cannot  be  admitted  into 
the  common  schools.  They  require  special  schools 


56  EDUCATION. 

where  they  will  be  taught  industry  as  well  as  learning, 
and  where  they  will  receive  some  food  which  will  enable 
them  to  remain  the  greater  part  of  the  day.  These 
schools  can  be  maintained  at  a  very  moderate  cost  to 
the  State, — probably  not  over  twenty  dollars  a  year  for 
each  child ;  and  they  would  extend  the  benefits  of  a 
suitable  education  and  training  to  the  lowest  in  the 
Commonwealth;  from  whom  prisons  and  workhouses 
and  reformatories  are  constantly  recruited  at  a  great 
loss  to  the  State. 


MEMORIAL 

From  the  President  of  the  Board  of  Public  Charities  to 
the  Constitutional  Convention  of  Pennsylvania. 

On  behalf  of  the  Board  of  Public  Charities,  the 
undersigned  begs  to  present  to  the  Constitutional 
Convention  some  considerations  bearing  upon  the 
seventeenth  and  eighteenth  sections  of  the  proposed 
article  on  "legislation,"  containing  certain  restrictions 
upon  legislative  appropriations.  These  sections,  it  is 
understood,  have  already  been  passed  to  a  third  read 
ing,  but  were  so  passed  before  the  article  on  education 
had  been  definitely  acted  upon. 

The  attention  of  the  convention  is,  in  the  first  place, 
respectfully  invited  to  the  present  state  of  its  constitu 
tional  provisions  in  reference  to  popular  education, 
(i)  The  constitution  is  to  require  in  general  the  main 
tenance  of  a  thorough  and  efficient  system  of  public 


EDUCATION.  57 

schools,  offering  the  opportunity  of  an  elementary 
education  to  all  the  children  of  the  State.  (2)  A 
constitutional  provision  for  compulsory  education  has 
been  rejected  by  the  convention.  (3)  A  provision  for 
the  establishment  by  the  legislature  of  special  schools 
for  "  neglected  children  "  has  also  been  rejected.  (4) 
The  municipalities  as  well  as  the  legislature  are  to  be 
forbidden  to  aid  such  private  institutions  as  now  exist 
for  that  purpose  (section  seven,  taxation  and  finance).* 
That  is  to  say,  with  the  exception  of  this  last  restric 
tive  provision,  the  common-school  system  of  the  State 
will  be  left  substantially  as  it  was  before,  the  legisla 
ture  being  required  to  continue  without  diminution  its 
annual  appropriations. 

In  the  second  place  the  attention  of  the  convention 
is  respectfully  recalled  to  a  few  of  the  simple  facts  of 
the  case : — 

i.  According  to  the  returns  of  the  census  of  1870, 
there  are  within  the  Commonwealth  of  Pennsylvania 
more  than  two  hundred  and  twenty-two  thousand 
persons  above  ten  years  of  age  unable  to  read  or  write, 
and  probably  the  true  number  of  such  is  not  less  than 
three  hundred  thousand  or  four  hundred  thousand,  of 
which  from  seventy-five  thousand  to  one  hundred 
thousand  are  under  the  age  of  twenty-one,  and  of  these 
last,  twenty  thousand  or  more  are  congregated  in  the 
single  city  of  Philadelphia. 


*  SEC.  7.  The  General  Assembly  shall  not  authorize  any  county,  city,  borough, 
township,  or  incorporated  district  to  become  a  stockholder  in  any  company, 
association,  or  corporation,  or  to  obtain  or  appropriate  money  for,  or  to  loan  its 
credit  to,  any  corporation,  association,  institution,  or  individual. 


58  EDUCATION. 

2.  This  large  army  of  neglected  children,  growing 
up  in  idleness,  ignorance,  vice,  and  crime,  who  are  not 
only  destined  to  increase  our  taxes,   to  endanger  our 
property,  and  disturb  our  peace,  to  infest  our  highways 
and  streets  with  mendicancy,  pillage,  and  violence,  to 
crowd  the  docks  of  our  court-rooms  and  fill  our  alms- 
houses,  jails,  and  penitentiaries,  but  who  are  soon  to 
exercise  with  us  and  over  us  the  sovereignty  of  the 
elective  franchise,  marching  up  to  the  polls  with  added 
thousands  of  new  recruits  every  year — these  are   the 
cancerous    source    of  what  is   probably  the    greatest 
peril  to  which  our  Commonwealth  and  free  institutions 
are  exposed. 

3.  This  evil  the  common-school  system,  as  at  present 
organized,  can  never  reach  and  remedy.     It  is  to  be 
understood  that  under  the  description  of  "  neglected 
children  "  are  meant  to  be  included  not  only  those  who 
lose  the  benefit  of  the  free  public   schools   from   the 
carelessness  or  willfulness  of  parents,  but  those  also — 
and   theirs  is  the  greater  number — who  are  deprived 
of  those  benefits  in  consequence  of  their  destitution  of 
any  parental   guardianship  ;   of  their  vagabond   lives, 
and  their  want  of  the  very  means  of  subsistence  if  they 
should  go  to  school ;  of  their  ragged  and  filthy  condi- 
dition,  or  their  depraved  and  vicious  habits,  or  their 
intractable  characters,  rendering  them   unfit  to  be  re 
ceived  at  school  with  the  other  children,  or  making  it 
improper  or  impossible  for  them  to  be  retained  there. 
The  reclaiming"  and  education  of  these  children  could 

o 

not  be  secured  even  by  any  law  of  compulsory  attend 
ance    at    school    merely,    but    means    must    also    be 


EDUCATION.  59 

provided  to  supply  them  with  food  and  clothing  and 
proper  domestic  guardianship  while  they  may  be  re 
ceiving  their  education  at  school.  If  compulsion  is 
needed  elsewhere,  charity  also  is  needed  here.  Our 
schools  may  be  ever  so  open  and  free,  and  sufficient 
for  all,  but  these  children  will  still  remain  outside. 
This  is  the  lesson  not  only  of  our  own  past  experience, 
but  wherever  the  system  of  free  schools  has  been  tried 
— whether  in  Europe  or  America,  in  Old  England  or  in 
New  England,  in  New  York  or  any  other  of  our  sister 
States.  It  has  been  found  necessary  to  supplement  the 
system  either  by  private  benefactions  or  public  appro 
priations  for  the  care  and  support  of  this  class  of  desti 
tute  and  neglected  children.  It  is  clear  that  they  have 
not  yet  been  reached  by  our  system  of  public  schools, 
admirable  and  thorough  as  has  been  its  management 
for  several  years  past.  Nor  are  they  likely  to  be 
reached  by  it,  for  it  would  seem  by  the  superintend 
ent's  last  report  that  the  chronic  evil  of  absenteeism 
from  the  schools  has  of  late  increased  rather  than 
diminished.  Unless  some  modification  or  enlarge 
ment  of  the  present  instrumentalities  is  adopted,  there 
is  no  reason  to  hope  that  the  public  schools  will  ever 
remedy  the  evil. 

4.  But  to  reach  and  remedy  this  evil  is  precisely 
the  chief  end  of  the  common-school  system.  These 
children  are  precisely  those  whose  education  the  State 
needs  to  care  for.  Most  of  the  children  of  well-to-do 
parents,  and  who  have  good  domestic  care  and  train 
ing,  will  be  tolerably  well  educated  whether  the  State 
provide  schools  for  them  or  not.  It  must  not  be 


r>^  EDUCA  T1ON. 

supposed,  therefore,  that  the  public  schools  have  very 
nearly  accomplished  their  purpose,  while  only  this 
residuum  remains  unaffected  by  them.  Rather  we 
must  remember  that  while  this  remains — and  remains 
in  its  present  enormous  proportions — they  have  en 
tirely  failed  of  attaining  their  principal  object. 

Now  the  legislature  may  do  either  or  both  of  those 
things  which  the  convention  has  refused  to  require  or 
recommend,  (i)  It  may  adopt  the  principle  of  com 
pulsory  education  for  the  whole  Commonwealth,  or 
may  authorize  its  local  adaption.  (2)  It  may  establish 
either  directly  or  indirectly,  through  the  local  authori 
ties,  special  schools  for  neglected  children.  Otherwise, 
under  the  proposed  section  seventen,*  if  adopted,  such 
children  must  be  left  to  be  cared  for,  if  cared  for  at 
all,  exclusively  by  private  agencies,  without  any  aid,  en 
couragement,  or  co-operation  whatever  from  the  State 
in  any  case,  or  from  the  local  authorities,  unless  such 
agencies  should  be  organized  outside  of  the  influence 
and  control  of  all  religious  bodies.  So  that,  in  this 
case,  the  State  would  either  have  to  do  the  whole 
work,  at  the  public  expense,  or  would  have  no  guar 
antee  that  such  children  would  be  cared  for  at  all ;  for 
the  aid  of  religion  is  not  invoked,  and  private  benevo 
lence,  unprompted  and  unsustained  by  the  religious 
sentiment,  even  though  receiving  a  questionable  and 
precarious  support  from  municipal  bounty,  can  hardly 
be  sufficient  for  the  whole  reliance. 


*  SEC.  17.  No  appropriation  shall  be  made  to  any  charitable  or  educational 
institution  not  under  the  absolute  control  of  the  Commonwealth,  other  than  nor- 
mal  schools  established  by  law  for  the  professional  training  of  teachers  for  the 
public  schools  of  the  State,  except  by  a  vote  of  two-thirds  of  all  the  members 
elected  to  each  home* 


EDUCATION.  6 1 

Under  such  circumstances,  what  is  the  wisest  course 
to  take  ?  Shall  the  legislature,  by  the  adoption  of  this 
section  seventeen,  be  practically  required  to  do  the 
whole  work  or  nothing  ?  Or,  by  a  modification  of  this 
section,  shall  it  be  left  untrammeled  to  adopt  the  inter 
mediate  course  of  encouraging  the  partial  efforts  of 
private  benevolence  by  its  fostering  aid  ?  This  is  the 
question. 

But  is  the  legislature,  in  any  event,  likely  to  under 
take  the  whole  work  ?  Is  there  not  reason  to  fear  that 
should  the  convention  finally  adopt  this  section  seven 
teen,  as  it  is  proposed,  they  will,  under  all  the  circum 
stances,  practically  give  the  full  weight  of  their  authority 
and  influence  in  favor  of  leaving  these  neglected  chil 
dren  absolutely  to  their  fate,  without  the  slightest  effort 
to  help  or  save  them,  and  thus  suffer  this  plague-spot  of 
the  body  politic  to  grow  and  fester,  and  spread  its 
pestilential  infection  without  restraint  or  remedy?  Is 
it  said  that  the  legislature  will  still  have  the  power  to 
introduce  the  system  of  compulsory  education,  either 
universally  or  partially,  and  thus  to  reach  and  remove 
the  evil  ?  But  by  this  course,  by  this  means  alone,  the 
whole  evil  cannot  be  reached  and  remedied ;  and  be 
sides,  the  convention  has  solemnly  refused  to  require 
or  recommend  such  a  course,  stamping  it  with  its  im 
plied  disapproval.  Is  it  said  that  the  legislature  may 
establish  or  authorize  the  particular  municipalities  to 
establish  special  schools  for  the  care  and  instruction 
of  this  class  of  children  ?  But  the  convention  has 
positively  frowned  upon  such  a  plan.  Is  it  said  that 
the  local  civil  authorities  may  aid  the  efforts  of  private 
benevolence  in  supporting  such  schools  ?  But  the 


62  EDUCATION-. 

convention  has  sternly  forbidden  them  to  aid  any  such 
institutions  as  now  exist  for  that  purpose,  and  has  not 
proposed  the  establishment  of  any  others.  Is  it  said 
that  at  least  the  State  itself  may  afford  such  aid  by 
direct  appropriations  ?  The  convention  will  have  for 
bidden  it  unless  a  full  vote  of  two-thirds  can  be  ob 
tained  for  it. 

That  is  to  say,  even  though  a  large  majority  of  the 
people,  through  their  chosen  representatives,  may  for 
years  and  years  seek  to  do  it,  they  shall  not,  so  long  as 
one-third  remain  opposed  ;  in  other  words,  the  ante 
cedent  probability  that  it  is  wrong  or  unwise  to  do  it,  is 
held  to  be  as  two  to  one  ;  so  that  to  effect  it  shall  require 
that  sort  of  earnest  zeal  and  public  agitation,  and  that 
overwhelming  majority  which  might  be  required  to 
change  the  fundamental  law  or  revolutionize  the  form  of 
government.  But  is  it  said  that,  at  all  events,  the  con 
vention  will  not  have  forbidden  private  benevolence  to 
exert  itself  to  any  extent,  and  under  the  impulse  of 
any  motives  whatever,  for  the  rescue  and  amendment 
of  these  poor,  neglected  outcasts  ?  This  is  true  ;  but 
then  the  convention  had  no  power  to  make  such  a  for 
mal  prohibition.  And  yet  it  may  seriously  be  asked 
whether,  if  section  seventeen  be  adopted  with  the  rest,  it 
will  not  appear  that  the  whole  moral  influence  of  the 
action  of  the  convention  will  tend  to  dampen  any  sym 
pathy  that  might  be  felt  for  this  class  of  children,  and  to 
paralyze  any  efforts  that  might  be  made  in  their  behalf 
in  any  quarter  or  in  any  form.  But  be  this  as  it  may, 
there  seems,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  but  little  reason  to 
expect  that  for  some  time  to  come,  and  until  a  great 
pressure  of  public  opinion  can  be  concentrated  on  the 


EDUCATION.  63 

subject,  the  legislature  will  be  induced  to  adopt  a  thor 
ough  system  of  compulsory  education  or  to  establish 
special  schools  for  this  class  of  neglected  children,  to 
be  exclusively  supported  at  the  public  expense.  The 
undersigned,  as  is  well  understood,  is  in  favor  of  both 
of  these  plans,  and  for  himself  knows  of  no  sufficient 
reason  against  them  ;  but  the  reasons,  whatever  they 
may  be,  which  have  weighed  with  the  convention 
against  them,  and  have  led  to  a  decision  which 
precludes  their  further  discussion  here,  will  be  likely, 
it  is  presumed,  to  weigh  with  a  majority  of  the  legis 
lature,  backed  up,  as  they  may  seem  to  be,  by  the 
authority  of  the  convention  itself.  And  may  it  not 
pertinently  be  asked,  why  it  is  that  while  both  of  these 
plans  of  doing  the  whole  work  by  State  authority 
and  at  the  public  expense — though  liable  to  such  ob 
jections  that  they  are  not  likely  soon  to  command  the 
support  of  a  majority  of  the  legislature — are  never 
theless  left  untrammeled  to  the  discretion  of  that  body  ; 
yet  this  other  plan  of  encouraging  and  supplementing 
private  efforts  by  State  aid,  not  being  liable  to  the  same 
objections,  and  being  at  any  time  likely,  it  may  be  pre 
sumed,  to  have  a  majority  of  the  legislature  in  its 
favor,  should  be  absolutely  forbidden,  or  compelled  to 
secure  the  support  of  full  two-thirds  of  all  the  mem 
bers  of  both  houses  ?  Why  not  trust  a  majority  of  the 
people  and  their  representatives  in  one  of  these  cases 
as  well  as  in  the  other  ?  Why  not  allow  them,  if  they 
will,  in  order  to  abate  an  enormous  and  crying  evil, 
and  to  accomplish  a  great  public  good,  to  adopt  a  course 
which  is  felt  to  be  less  liable  to  popular  objection,  as 
well  as  another  which  is  felt  to  be  more  so  ? 


64  EDUCATION. 

Is  it  said  that  special  restriction  is  required  in  this 
case,  because  such  legislative  action  is  liable  to  abuse? 
But  all  legislative  power  is  liable  to  be  abused  or  ex 
ercised  unwisely,  and  we  must  take  this  risk  or  abolish 
government  altogether.  The  true  questions  are,  first, 
is  the  proposed  action,  in  matter  and  form,  a  proper 
subject  of  State  legislation?  and,  second,  is  it  demanded 
for  the  public  welfare  ?  As  to  the  former  question,  that 
this  is  a  proper  subject  of  legislation  is  indirectly  admit 
ted  by  its  being  allowed  on  a  two-thirds  vote ;  and  as 
to  the  latter  question,  it  is  admitted  on  all  sides  that  the 
rescue  and  education  of  these  neglected  children  would 
be  a  great  public  benefit ;  many  of  us  think  it  essential 
to  the  very  existence  and  permanence  of  our  free  in 
stitutions.  Shall  we  then  commit  political  suicide  lest 
the  legislature  should  make  a  political  blunder  ?  Shall 
we  abdicate  the  very  power  of  promoting  the  public 
weal  because  that  power  may  be  abused  ?  Shall  the 
public  good  be  neglected  or  even  put  under  the  ban, 
because  the  legislature  cannot  always  be  trusted  to  do 
what  is  best?  Shall  the  people  not  be  allowed  to 
manage  their  own  affairs  according  to  their  own  dis- 

o  o 

cretion,  because,  through  their  representatives,  they 
may  not  always  manage  them  wisely  ?  Shall  we  once 
for  all  acknowledge  the  experiment  of  representative 
self-government  a  failure? 

But  perhaps  this  particular  form  of  legislative  action 
is  thought  to  be  specially  liable  to  abuse.  Is  it  so  ? 
Has  such  a  disposition  been  shown  by  the  Legislature 
of  Pennsylvania  or  of  other  States  to  squander  the 
public  money  in  educating  or  aiding  to  educate  desti 
tute  children,  that  it  should  need  to  be  specially  guarded 


EDUCATION.  65 

against  in  the  very  constitution  ?  Even  if  religious  or 
ecclesiastical  bodies  should  come  forward  and  offer  to 
establish  schools  for  the  education  of  such  children, 
adding  moral  and  religious  instruction,  it  is  difficult  to 
see  why  that  in  itself  should  be  a  bar  to  the  bestow- 
ment  of  State  aid  towards  the  support  of  such  schools; 
and  probably  if  there  was  but  one  form  of  religious 
belief  and  profession  in  the  State,  it  would  not  be  so 
considered.  But  where  there  is  a  variety  of  religious 
creeds  among  us — while  there  are  several  sects  and 
denominations  in  earnest  rivalry  and  conflict  with  one 
another,  and  while  religious  partisanship  remains  so 
strong  as  it  is — so  strong  as  often  to  override  all  other 
motives  and  considerations — it  may  freely  be  admitted 
that  for  the  legislature  to  make  appropriations  from 
the  public  funds  in  aid  of  sectarian  institutions,  how 
ever  excellent  their  general  objects  and  tendencies, 
would  be  an  exercise  of  power  especially  liable  to 
abuse.  But  this  form  of  abuse  being  effectually 
guarded  against  in  this  section  eighteen  as  well  as  in 
section  two  of  the  article  on  education,*  is  there  any 
such  special  liability  to  abuse  in  making  the  appropri 
ations  contemplated  in  section  seventeen  as  should 
require  the  special  prevention  of  the  two-thirds  vote  ? 
The  institutions  to  be  aided  will  not  be  sectarian,  not 
under  the  control  of  any  religious  denomination,  not 

*  SECTION  18.  No  appropriations,  except  for  pensions  or  gratuities  for  mili 
tary  services,  shall  be  made  for  charitable,  educational,  or  benevolent  purposes,  to 
any  person  or  community,  nor  to  any  denominational  or  sectarian  institution, 
corporation,  or  association. 

SEC.  2.  No  money  raised  for  the  support  of  the  public  schools  of  this  Com 
monwealth  shall  be  appropriated  to  or  used  for  the  support  of  any  sectarian 
school. 


66  EDUCATION. 

for  private  gain  or  emolument,  not  addressed  to  the 
special  interests  of  any  party,  ecclesiastical  or  politi 
cal  ;  they  will  simply  aim,  by  private  efforts  and  bene 
factions,  to  accomplish  some  of  those  charitable  and 
educational  purposes  in  which  the  highest  interests  of 
the  State  are  most  deeply  involved,  and  for  which  the 
State  makes  no  adequate  provision  by  her  general 
system  of  public  schools.  Shall  the  legislature  be 
permitted  freely  to  aid  such  institutions  ? 

If  attention  is  called  to  the  great  cost  of  the  institu 
tions,  whether  schools,  refuges,  or  homes,  here  contem 
plated,  and  if  the  danger  of  their  demanding  exorbitant 
drafts  from  the  public  treasury  is  urged  in  favor  of  a 
restriction  of  appropriations  in  their  behalf,  the  answer 
is,  those  institutions  will  not  hold  the  purse-strings,  and 
those  who  do  hold  them  are  not  likely  to  give  more 
than,  in  their  judgment,  the  public  good  requires.  The 
question  is,  shall  they  be  restrained  from  giving  as 
much?  For  the  State  to  impose  such  restraint  upon 
itself  seems  little  short  of  absurdity.  Indeed,  this  is 
the  last  of  all  directions  in  which  to  limit  the  public 
expenditure.  Economy  here  is  eventual  extravagance, 
and  extravagance  the  surest  economy.  The  public 
benefit  resulting  from  a  removal  of  the  evil  in  question 
would  abundantly  repay  all  the  cost,  even  though  the 
whole  were  drawn  from  the  public  treasury.  But  it  is 
to  be  especially  noted  that  the  plan  here  in  view  is  one 
which  is  contrived  to  relieve  the  public  treasury  instead 
of  burdening  it,  always  presuming  one  thing,  that  the 
end  contemplated  is  acknowledged  to  be  demanded  by 
the  general  good,  and  that  the  State  recognizes  her 
interest  in  the  removal  of  so  great  an  evil.  The  State 


EDUCATION.  67 

might  justly  and  wisely  assume  the  whole  expense,  but 
the  present  suggestion  is,  that,  in  case  the  establishment 
and  support  of  the  remedial  institutions  be  thrown,  in 
the  first  instance,  on  private  benevolence,  the  legisla 
ture,  without  being  hampered  by  any  special  restric 
tions,  should  then  be  permitted  to  make,  from  time  to 
time,  such  appropriations  in  encouragement  and  aid  of 
such  institutions  as  should  be  deemed  wise  and  reason 
able,  and  consistent  with  the  most  rigid  economy  of  the 
public  funds.  And  it  is  respectfully  suggested  that  the 
same  economical  motives  which  weigh  in  the  minds  of 
the  members  of  the  convention  may  be  confidently 
counted  upon  to  weigh  in  the  legislature  with  quite 
sufficient  force  to  keep  its  appropriations  for  such 
objects,  and  under  such  circumstances,  within  due 
bounds.*  At  all  events,  the  State  would  pay  but  a 
part  of  the  price  for  the  benefit  which  it  would  receive. 
If  it  be  objected  that  the  evil  is  local,  and  that  the 
whole  State  ought  not  to  be  taxed  for  the  relief  or 
benefit  of  certain  particular  communities,  the  answer 
is  three-fold  :— 

i.  Then  surely  those  communities  should  be  allowed 
to  tax  themselves  for  the  removal  of  the  evil,  and  to 
economize  in  that  taxation,  by  availing  themselves,  as 
far  as  they  should  see  fit,  of  all  the  aid  they  could  ob 
tain  from  private  sources. 


*  The  total  sum  appropriated  by  the  Legislature  of  Pennsylvania  to  local 
charities,  embracing  hospitals,  homes,  dispensaries,  asylums,  &c.,  &c.,  from 
1752  to  1872,  exclusive,  a  period  of  one  hundred  and  twenty  years,  amounts 
to  $377,000,  including  the  sum  of  $70,000  granted  by  the  Provincial  Assembly 
to  the  Pennsylvania  Hospital,  during  the  latter  half  of  the  last  century. 


68  EDUCATION. 

2.  By  far  the  greater  part  of  all  taxation  is  for  the 
direct  benefit  of  others  than  those  who  pay  the  taxes. 
The  very  idea  of  a  state  involves  the  principle  of 
mutual  protection  and  helpfulness,  in  which,  after  the 
analogy  of  a  mutual  insurance,  the  stronger  parts  give 
the  weaker  more  than  they  receive.  The  state  is  built 
upon  a  community,  a  solidarity,  but  not  a  perfect 
equality  of  individual  interests.  When  the  different 
parts,  instead  of  consenting  in  mutual  co-operation, 
fall  into  dissensions,  and  jealousies  of  section  with 
section,  marshaling  east  and  west,  or  city  and  country, 
or  agriculturist  and  manufacturer,  or  rich  and  poor, 
against  each  other,  the  very  existence  of  the  state  is 
endangered,  and  its  proper  purpose  and  object  are 
annulled.  But  if  the  State  is  not  to  be  taxed  for  the 
removal  of  the  evil  because  it  is  local,  how  large  a 
community  is  to  be  taxed  for  that  purpose — a  county, 
a  whole  city,  a  ward,  a  precinct,  or  each  individual  on 
his  own  account?  The  evil  is  not  equally  distributed 
over  any  area,  however  small,  short  of  each  individual's 
domicile  ;  a^id  when  that  is  reached  it  is  precisely  some 
other  individual  or  individuals  that  must  be  taxed  for 
its  removal.  Besides,  the  whole  common-school  system 
is  especially  liable  to  the  objection  in  question.  Here 
the  rich  are  taxed  for  the  education  of  the  poor ;  those 
who  have  no  children  for  the  education  of  the  children 
of  others ;  and  the  State  taxes  herself  by  the  million 
to  distribute  her  aid  to  the  different  localities  and  com 
munities,  giving  most  to  those  places  where  the  most 
children  are  found  to  need  the  appropriation. 

But  the  evil  is,  after  all,  by  no  means  so  purely  local 
as  seems  to  be  generally  assumed.  It  exists  and  is 


EDUCATION.  69 

formidable  in  all  the  counties  of  the  State.  If  the  evil 
is  greater  in  one  part  of  the  State  than  in  another,  it 
cannot  be  confined  to  that  portion,  but  will  spread  its 
effects  far  and  wide.  And  if  one  portion  of  the  State 
remedies  the  evil  within  itself,  the  beneficial  conse 
quences  of  such  remedy  will  be  shared  by  all  the  other 
parts  of  the  State.  This  dangerous  element  is,  of 
course,  found  mainly  in  the  thickly-settled  communities, 
and  there  it  must  be  encountered  and  dealt  with. 
Eventually  it  is  found  in  maturity  all  over  the  State, 
spreading  its  corrupting  influences,  filling  our  prisons 
and  almshouses,  and  festering  with  disease  in  the 
hospitals.  Under  proper  State  inspection,  surely  the 
legislature  should  be  allowed  to  aid,  say  by  a  per 
capita  allowance,  industrial  and  other  schools,  conducted 
by  private  individuals  for  the  rescue  of  such  children 
from  the  ruin  which,  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten,  is  sure 
otherwise  to  overtake  them  and  the  State,  from  the 
blighting  influences  of  their  degraded  and  criminal 
lives.  If,  for  example,  there  are  twenty  thousand 
neglected  children  in  Philadelphia,  and  if,  in  the  rest  of 
the  State,  there  are  fifty  or  sixty  thousand  instead  of 
the  more  exact  proportion  of  seventy  or  eighty  thou 
sand,  is  this  a  reason  for  regarding  the  evil  as  in  such 
sense  local,  that  the  State  has  no  common  interest  in 
it?  It  is  undoubtedly  more  concentrated  where  the 
population  is  more  concentrated,  and  there,  from  its 
very  concentration,  it  becomes  not  only  more  conspicu 
ous,  but  more  fearfully  dangerous.  But  are  not  the 
safety  and  prosperity  of  the  State  largely  bound  up  in 
the  safety  and  prosperity  of  the  city  ?  May  not  the 
corruptions  of  the  city  spread  their  contaminating 


70  EDUCATION. 

influences  into  the  State  ?  May  not  the  accumulation  of 
ignorant  and  unprincipled  voters  in  the  city  control  the 
elections  and  revolutionize  the  political  character  of  the 
State  ?  Does  not  the  State  assume  to  govern  the  city 
and  bind  it  by  the  constitution  and  laws  which  it 
makes  ?  And  would  the  State  allow  the  city  to  pro 
tect  itself,  for  instance,  from  the  increase  of  this 
dangerous  element,  by  prohibiting  the  ingress  into  its 
limits  of  the  families  of  ignorant  and  destitute 
foreigners?  If  the  city  should  remedy  this  evil  within 
its  own  boundaries,  won  13  not  the  State  reap  a  double 
benefit,  in  the  first  place,  so  far  as  the  city  is  a  part 
and  a  large  part  of  the  State,  and  secondly,  by  the  dis 
tribution  from  the  city  into  other  parts  of  the  State  of 
great  numbers  of  industrious  and  well-educated  and 
respectable,  instead  of  idle  and  ignorant  people  ?  And 
will  the  State  refuse  to  pay  anything  for  the  common 
benefit  ?  For  it  is  again  to  be  observed  that,  on  the 
plan  now  proposed,  the  city,  through  its  private  bene 
factions,  together,  perhaps,  with  its  municipal  appropria 
tions,  would  assume  the  principal  weight  of  the  burden, 
and  the  State  would  come  in  with  only  such  aid  and 
encouragement  as  it  might  see  fit  to  bestow.  Shall  all 
such  appropriations  by  the  State  be  forbidden  or  hamp 
ered  with  such  restrictions  as  may  practically  amount 
to  a  prohibition  ? 

The  legislature,  it  may  be  finally  said,  cannot  be 
trusted  with  an  arbitrary  control  of  the  people's  treas 
ury  ;  die  people  cannot  be  sure  of  having  honest  and 
intelligent  legislators.  \Yhat,  then,  is  the  true  remedy  ? 
Will  you,  by  constitutional  provisions,  secure  as  far  as 
possible  the  thorough  education  of  all  the  people  in 


EDUCATION.  71 

knowledge  and  virtue,  and  guard  with  ever}'  possible 
barrier  the  purity  of  elections?  Or  will  you  leave 
thousands  and  tens  of  thousands  of  children  to  grow 
up  in  ignorance  and  vice  and  thus  assume  the  elective 
franchise,  only  providing  constitutional  barriers  against 
any  aid  being  given  to  the  State  for  their  education  ; 
and  then  proceed  to  restrain  the  legislature  and  strip 
it  of  its  accustomed  powers,  and  thus  and  so  far  deprive 
the  very  people  of  the  functions  of  self-government? 
That  the  legislature  cannot  be  trusted  means  that  the 

o 

people  cannot  be  trusted.  To  restrain  the  legislature  is 
to  restrain  the  people.  If  the  legislature  may  not  make 
laws,  the  people  cannot  make  them  ;  for  the  people 
have  no  other  organ  than  the  legislature  whereby  to 
perform  that  function.  Is  it  not  inverting  the  order  of 
things  to  leave  the  people  in  ignorance,  and  then  re 
strain  their  legislature?  Would  it  not  be  better  to 
secure  the  intelligence  of  the  people  and  the  purity  of 
their  elections,  and  then  trust  their  chosen  representa 
tives  ?  It  is  true  that  the  legislature  may  be  once  for 
all  constitutionally  restrained  from  meddling  with  mat 
ters  where  experience  has  shown  that  their  interference 
is  productive  of  more  harm  than  good  to  the  State. 
But  the  education  of  the  people — the  thorough  educa 
tion  of  all  the  people — is  admitted  on  all  hands  to  be 
pre-eminently  a  matter  of  high  public  concern,  and  a 
proper  subject  of  State  legislation.  It  is  submitted, 
therefore,  that  this  is  a  case  in  which,  beyond  all  others, 
the  legislature  should  be  left  free. 

A  draft  of  section  seventeen,  modified  in  accord 
ance  with  the  views  thus  imperfectly  expressed,  is  with 
great  diffidence  herewith  submitted.  To  require  the 


72  EDUCATION. 

inspection  of  the  institutions  in  question,  and  the  special 
recommendation  of  aid  to  them,  by  a  board  of  commis 
sioners  appointed  for  the  purpose  by  the  governor,  the 
legislature,  or  the  department  of  the  interior,  if  such 
a  department  should  be  created,  is  thought  to  furnish 
a  sufficient  guarantee  against  improper  or  wasteful  ap 
propriations.  It  is  presumed  that  the  wisdom  of  the 
legislature  could  easily  frame  a  law,  by  which  private 
beneficence,  municipal  co-operation,  and  State  aid, 
might  all  be  combined  and  concentrated  upon  the  same 
great  end,  leaving  the  institutions  in  question,  so  far  as 
they  should  require  no  compulsory  or  penal  action,  to 
the  simpler  or  cheaper  methods  of  private  manage 
ment  ;  thus  utilizing  private  benevolence  and  economy 
for  the  public  good.  Shall  the  Constitution  of  Penn 
sylvania,  instead  of  encouraging  and  facilitating  such 
a  result,  only  throw  obstacles  in  the  way  of  its  accom 
plishment  ? 

A  modified  draft  of  section  eighteen  is  also  ap 
pended,  in  which  the  prohibition  of  appropriations  to 
sectarian  institutions  is  made  absolute,  the  clause  for 
charitable,  educational,  or  benevolent  purposes  being 
omitted.  It  is  not  perceived  why  against  just  those 
purposes  there  should  be  an  expression  of  such  special 
antipathy.  Shall  the  legislature  be  allowed  to  make 
appropriations  to  anything  and  for  anything,  provided 
only  that  it  should  not  propose  thereby  to  aid  any 
charitable,  educational,  or  benevolent  purposes  ?  May 
the  legislature  make  appropriations,  for  example,  for 
a  peculiarly  ecclesiastical  or  religious  purpose,  for 
building  a  church,  or  paying  the  salary  of  a  clergyman 
of  any  denomination  ;  and  yet  shall  it  be  forbidden  to 


EDUCATION.  73 

aid  in  the  education  of  its  own  outcast  children  in  a 
school  established  and  supported  by  such  a  denomina 
tion  ?  It  is  not  supposed  that  such  a  distinction  was 
intended.  It  is  therefore  suggested,  as  most  consonant 
with  the  presumed  purpose  of  the  section,  and  the  pro 
hibition  against  all  such  appropriations  be  made  once 
for  all  absolute  and  universal. 

It  may  be  well  to  mention  here — for  the  fact  is  not 
generally  known  even  to  legislators — that  but  four  of 
what  are  called  "  State  institutions,"  of  a  permanent 
character,  are  "absolutely"  under  "State  control." 
These  are  the  Eastern  and  Western  Penitentiaries,  the 
Pennsylvania  State  Lunatic  Hospital,  at  Harrisburg, 
and  the  Hospital  for  the  Insane  of  the  Northern  District 
of  Pennsylvania,  at  Danville.  All  the  others  are  pri 
vate  charitable  corporations,  to  which  the  legislature 
has  been  in  the  habit  of  orranting-  State  aid  at  each 

o  o 

session,  in  the  same  manner  precisely  as  it  has  done 
to  the  former.  Shall  the  education  of  the  blind  and 
the  deaf  and  dumb  be  restricted  by  a  two-thirds 
rule,  because  private  beneficence  originally  founded 
these  institutions  and  continues  to  share  the  expense 
of  maintaining  them  ?  Is  it  well  to  curtail  the  oppor 
tunities  of  the  insane  poor  to  admission  into  that  noble 
asylum  at  Dixmont,  because  it  exists  under  the  same 
conditions?  or  to  prejudice  the  claims  of  delinquent 
children  to  the  reforming  influences  of  the  refuges  of 
Allegheny  and  Philadelphia  counties,  or  feeble-minded 
children  to  education  and  maintenance  in  that  model 
training-school  of  Delaware  county?  The  supposed 
impolicy  of  encouraging  and  aiding  private  zeal  and 
benevolence,  in  the  work  of  the  education  and  reform  of 


74  EDUCATION, 

neglected  children,  has  long  been  practically  disavowed 
by  those  enlightened  governments  of  Europe  which 
have  shown  any  interest  in  the  improvement  of 
this  juvenile  class  as  a  measure  of  philanthropy  or 
political  concern.  More  especially  has  this  been 
the  case  in  Great  Britain,  which  has  given  all  such 
schools  a  recognized  status,  supports  them  largely, 
and  allows,  in  the  case  of  the  private  reformatories, 
the  magistrates  to  send  children  for  detention  in 
them.  The  government  accepted  this  policy,  how 
ever,  only  after  it  had  been  incontestibly  shown  that 
reformatory  schools  could  be  thus  established  and 
their  objects  most  successfully  attained.  It  had  been 
found  there,  as  it  is  most  lamentably  the  case  in  this 
State,  that  the  refuges  or  reform  schools,  which  main 
tain  the  unelastic  character  of  State  establishments, 
and  which  mingle  together,  as  they  must,  the  highly 
criminal  youth  with  the  barely  offending  ones,  guard 
ing  them  all  as  criminals  by  strict  surveillance  and 
within  high  walls,  take  more  or  less  the  form  and  com 
plexion  of  prisons,  and  that  the  children  discharged 
therefrom  are  regarded  with  some  such  distrust  as  at 
taches  to  discharged  convicts,  and  the  disposal  of  the 
inmates  to  eligible  situations  is  exceedingly  difficult — 
as  a  rule,  almost  impossible.  "  The  results  of  this 
(the  later)  system,"  writes  the  Rev.  Sydney  Turner, 
inspector  of  the  reformatory  and  industrial  schools  of 
England,  "  have  been  very  encouraging,"  In  many 
schools  of  either  class,  eighty  per  cent,  and  upwards 
have  turned  out  well  after  their  discharge  ;  and  these 

o 

results  are  taken  from  the  returns  which  the  managers 
of  each  school  have  to  make  for  the  three  years  succeed- 


EDUCATION.  75 

ing  each  inmate  s  discharge,  of  his  character  and  circum 
stances.  The  results  are  seen  still  more  decidedly  in 
the  diminution  of  the  numbers  of  the  younger  class  of 
criminals,  and  the  lighter  character  of  the  crimes  of 
which  our  juvenile  offenders  are  now  more  commonly 
found  guilty. 

"In  the  year  1856,  when  this  system  began  to  be  in 
more  active  operation,  the  number  of  juvenile  of 
fenders  committed  for  one  year  was  13,981  ;  in  1858, 
when  the  system  had  spread  and  taken  root,  the  num 
ber  sank  to  7622;  and  in  1870,  in  spite  of  the  very 
large  increase  of  our  population,  the  number  of  young 
offenders  committed  was  but  9998." 

Submitted  with  great  respect  by  your  memorialist 
and  humble  servant, 

GEO.  L.  HARRISON, 

President. 
PHILADELPHIA,  September  i5th,  1873. 


SECTIONS    17    AND    1 8    MODIFIED. 

SECTION  17.  The  legislature  may  make  appropria 
tions  to  such  normal  schools  as  may  be  established  by 
law,  for  the  professional  training  of  teachers  for  the 
public  schools  of  the  State ;  and  in  aid  of  schools  or 
homes  which  maybe  established  under  provisions  of  a 
general  statute  for  the  care  and  education  of  such 
vagrant  or  abandoned  or  destitute  and  neglected  chil 
dren  as  cannot  be  gathered  into  the  public  schools ; 
but  no  appropriations  shall  be  made  to  any  charitable 


7  6  EDUCATION. 

or  educational  institution  not  under  the  absolute  con 
trol  of  the  Commonwealth,  except  upon  the  special 
recommendation  of  a  board  of  commissioners  ap 
pointed  by  law  to  visit  and  inspect  such  institutions. 

SEC.  1 8.  No  appropriation  shall  ever  be  made  to 
any  ecclesiastical,  denominational,  or  sectarian  institu 
tion,  corporation,  or  association,  nor  shall  any  appro 
priation  (except  for  pensions  or  bounties  for  military 
service)  be  made  by  way  of  gratuity  to  any  person  or 
community  whatever. 


REFORMATION  OF  NEGLECTED,  DESTITUTE, 
AND  VICIOUS  CHILDREN. 

Our  suggestions  hitherto  have  related  only  to  the 
amelioration  of  poverty  and  the  cure  of  crime  in  the 
community.  We  have  reached  now  the  more  import 
ant  and  hopeful  subject  of  the  prevention  and  final 
eradication  of  both  ;  vice  and  misery  are  not  limited  to 
the  adult  classes  who  fill  our  prisons  and  almshouses  ; 
if  they  were,  the  certainty  of  their  extirpation  would  be 
but  a  matter  of  time.  But  behind  these  poor  wretches 
range  their  children,  line  after  line,  from  youth  to 
infancy,  the  "  serried  ranks  of  woe,"  with  the  sign  of 
their  heritage  of  want  and  guilt  upon  their  faces, 
pressing  forward  to  take  their  turn  in  the  prisoner's 
dock,  the  poor-house,  or  the  jail  cell. 

Common  sense  tells  us  every  day  that  each  of  the 
hungry,  vicious,  filthy  children,  that  we  pass  in  our 
streets  or  alleys,  is  driven  inexorably  by  want  and 


EDUCATION.  77 

ignorance,  year  by  year,  nearer  to  one  or  the  other 
of  the  dead-locks  in  life ;  driven  there  to  become 
not  only  a  burden  upon  the  State,  but  an  active  evil 
influence  in  it ;  and,  more  than  this,  the  most  tragical 
of  all  spectacles  the  world  can  offer,  a  depraved  human 
soul,  charging  before  God  its  loss  and  ruin  upon 
society.  To  busy  ourselves  alone  with  mature  and 
developed  crime,  and  to  ignore  the  breeding  mass  of 
embryo  vice  beneath,  from  which  it  is  steadily  supplied, 
is  to  attempt  to  dam  the  river  at  its  mouth  when  it  has 
grown  into  an  irresistible  torrent,  which  but  a  trifling 
effort  would  have  dried  up  at  the  fountain. 

The  present  generation  is  learning  wisdom  slowly 
in  this  matter.  In  England,  Germany,  France,  and  in 
the  local  and  private  efforts  for  their  instruction  and 
reform  in  this  country,  the  weight  of  influence  is 
brought  to  bear  upon  the  children  rather  than  the 
adults  of  our  dangerous  classes.  The  reform  of  the 
hardened  convict,  weighted  with  the  habits  and  asso 
ciations  of  half  a  life-time,  will  usually  do  no  more  than 
make  him  passive  in  either  good  or  evil,  while  the 
education  and  moral  training  of  a  child  gives  us  an 
active  element  of  good  in  the  State. 

Such  efforts  for  prevention  of  crime  among  us  are, 
as  we  stated,  but  local  or  private.  The  Common 
wealth  of  Pennsylvania  has  been  especially  tardy  and 
languid  in  her  recognition  of  their  utility.  Her  total 
contribution  to  the  homes,  asylums,  hospitals,  &c., 
through  which  these  lowest  classes  of  the  poor  are 
reached,  has  been,  for  the  one  hundred  and  twenty 
years  ending  in  1871,  but  $377,000,  while  the  first 
cost  of  one  of  her  penitentiaries  for  crime  exceeded  a 


7  8  EDUCATION. 

million  and  a  half.  Nor  is  the  interior  machinery  of 
government  in  the  Commonwealth  employed  as  yet 
in  the  rooting  out  of  this  quick-growing  crop  of  crime. 
Vice  matured  is  cherished  and  cared  for,  with  so  little 
attempt  at  reform,  that  it  would  seem  as  if  its  genera 
tion  rather  than  regeneration  were  the  object  to  be 
attained.  Every  county  has  its  jail  and  poor-house 
filled  with  idle  paupers  and  prisoners,  a  dead  weight 
on  the  working,  honest  tax-payer,  while  there  are  but 
two  schools  of  reform  in  the  State  where  the  immature 
pauper  or  prisoner  can  be  stopped  short  in  his  career, 
taught  habits  of  thrift  and  industry,  and  given  a  handi 
craft  which  will  enable  him  to  become  a  useful  and 
self-supporting  citizen. 

The  blind  folly  of  this  preference  for  the  punish 
ment  rather  than  the  prevention  of  crime  is  equaled 
only  by  that  of  the  farmer,  who  should  expend  his 
time  and  strength,  year  after  year,  in  cutting  down  per 
petually  renewed  crops  of  weeds,  instead  of  occupying 
his  ground  with  wholesome  grain,  which  would  yield 
him  fair  and  abundant  harvests. 

What,  then,  is  the  first  step  in  the  prevention  of 
crime  ?  We  answer,  education  !  The  statistics  of 
every  country  prove  the  large  proportion  which  the 
illiterate  bear  to  the  whole  number  of  criminals. 

It  is  estimated  that  in  the  sixteen  Southern  States 
two-thirds  of  the  prisoners  are  illiterate,  while  in  the 
rest  of  the  Union  more  than  one-third  are  so  ;  which 
gives  us  about  one-half  the  whole  number  of  prisoners 
as  without  education.  In  the  prison  statistics  of  New 
York  City  (where  crime,  its  causes  and  results  are  con 
densed  with  photographic  clearness  for  the  expert)  it 


EDUCATION.  79 

is  reported  that  in  1871,  in  a  population  of  942,242, 
there  were  62,238  persons  unable  to  read  and  write; 
but  of  51,466  prisoners  in  that  year  19,160  were  illiter 
ate,  showing  that,  of  the  ignorant  class,  one  in  three 
committed  crimes,  while  of  those  who  could  read  or 
write  the  proportion  of  offenders  was  as  one  in  twenty- 
seven. 

There  is  no  need,  however,  to  multiply  such  statis 
tics  as  these ;  the  experience  of  every  man  tells  him 
that  the  ignorant  are  weak  and  fall  stupidly  and  easily 
into  error. 

In  Massachusetts,  in  the  same  year,  out  of  97,742 
illiterate,  4791  were  criminals — that  is,  one  in  twenty, 
while  the  proportion  of  criminals  in  the  class  who  had 
received  a  primary  education  was  as  i  to  126^.  In 
the  penitentiaries  and  county  jails  of  our  own  State, 
practically  one-half  of  the  inmates  are  illiterate. 

We  are  aware  that  it  is  often  declared  that  "  merely 
to  read  and  write  will  not  diminish  crime  or  make 
better  citizens."  But  the  practical  alternative  is  not 
between  a  knowledge  of  reading  and  writing  on  the 
one  hand,  and  habits  of  morality  and  religion  on  the 
other;  but  between  so  much  knowledge  as  is  involved 
in  reading  and  writing  and  no  education  at  all ;  be 
tween  so  much  knowledge  as  that  or  blank  ignorance 
or  a  training  only  in  habits  of  vice  and  crime. 

But  we  believe  that  there  is  a  natural  affinity  be 
tween  knowledge  and  good  morals ;  between  the 
normal  culture  of  the  intellect  and  of  the  heart ;  be 
tween  truth  and  rectitude;  and  that  even  the  mere 
knowledge  of  reading  and  writing  increases  both  the 
means  and  the  tendency  to  acquire  both  the  knowledge 


8o  EDUCATION. 

and  the  habits  of  virtue  and  good  morals.  And,  be 
sides,  such  instruction  is  not  obtained  to  the  exclusion 
of  moral  and  even  religious  training.  Ninety-nine  in 
a  hundred  of  the  teachers  in  the  public  schools  of 
Pennsylvania  are  and  will  continue  to  be  moral,  and 
nine-tenths  are  religious  persons.  Such  instruction 
and  training  radiate  constantly,  in  an  unconscious  in 
fluence,  from  the  person,  bearing,  and  example  of  the 
teacher,  even  where  formal  lessons  and  special  exer 
cises  are  not  employed  to  promote  them. 

Any  scheme  for  the  redemption  of  neglected  and 
vicious  children,  however,  is  incomplete  which  simply 
aims  to  quicken  their  brains ;  the  habits  of  thought 
must  be  made  wholesome  and  pure,  just  as  cleanly 
habits  of  body  are  inculcated;  their  moral  sense  must 
be  awakened,  and  self-respect  cherished ;  and  their 
conceptions  of  God  elevated  and  vitalized  by  being 
brought  to  bear  on  their  daily  life. 

There  is  a  vague  belief  in  the  public  mind  (and  a 
consequent  apathy  thereon)  that  this  moral  training 
ought  to  reach  a  child  through  domestic  influences, 
and  that  the  State  is  only  responsible  for  the  intellect 
ual  instruction  which  the  public  schools  supply.  These 
schools,  it  is  argued,  are  amply  sufficient  to  educate  the 
eighty  thousand  to  one  hundred  thousand  persons  in 
the  State  under  the  age  of  twenty-one  who  are  unable 
to  read  and  write.  Acting  under  this  conviction,  the 
constitutional  convention  refused  to  extend  to  them 
any  other  relief,  and  hindered  the  action  of  the  legisla 
ture  by  requiring  a  two-thirds  vote  before  further  aid 
from  the  State  could  be  extended  to  them.  The  argu 
ment  appears  plausible.  The  State  provides  a  costly 


EDUCATION.  8 1 

machinery  of  education,  and  if  certain  classes  will  not 
avail  themselves  of  it  the  loss  and  punishment  must 
be  theirs. 

We  present  the  plain  facts  of  the  case.  The  schools 
are,  as  a  rule,  so  admirable  that  they  are  used  not  only 
by  the  working  but  wealthier  classes.  Rules  of  clean 
liness,  neatness  in  dress,  &c.,  are  established  which 
effectually  exclude  the  ragged,  filthy  hordes  who  need 
this  training  most ;  and  the  demands  upon  the  intel 
lectual  exertions  of  the  children  in  the  schools  of  the 
large  cities  are  so  great,  and  the  display  at  the  "exhi 
bitions"  so  costly,  that  it  requires  the  most  wholesome 
and  plentiful  food  to  enable  a  child  to  bear  the  physi 
cal  strain  of  the  one,  and  no  small  expenditure  of 
money  to  meet  the  demand  of  the  other.  It  sounds 
well  in  theory  to  point  to  our  school-houses  as  a  gift 
of  the  State  to  the  poor,  but  the  actual  fact  is  that  the 
hungry  little  beggar  at  their  doors  has  no  more  chance 
of  admission  than  Lazarus  into  the  gates  of  Dives. 

Of  this  class  there  are  some  twenty  thousand  in  the 
city  of  Philadelphia  alone,  and  a  like  proportion  in  the 
other  large  cities.  Even  if  they  were  accepted  they 
would  not  enter  the  schools,  as  they  are  either  utterly 
homeless  or  the  children  of  parents  unable  to  feed  and 
clothe  them,  and  they  are  obliged  to  keep  up  their 
wretched  lives  by  either  begging  or  theft.  We  point 
you  to  this  army  of  destitution  and  vice  and  ask  what 
shall  we  do  with  it?  Barred  out  from  the  public  schools; 
barred  from  the  trades  by  the  stringent  laws  of  the 
trades-unions;  in  lack  of  food  and  clothing,  what  is 
left  to  them  but  crime  ?  Paris,  in  the  hands  of  her  neg 
lected,  ignorant  poor,  gives  us  a  suggestive  warning. 


82  EDUCATION. 

Ignore  their  condition  but  a  few  years  longer,  and 
with  the  ballot-box  in  their  control,  the  problem  of  the 
hour  may  be,  what  will  they  do  with  us  ? 

We  propose  as  a  remedy  for  this  evil,  first,  the  con 
tinued  aid  of  the  State  to  reformatory  schools,  and  the 
alteration  of  these  schools  into  institutions  bearing  less 
of  a  penal  and  more  of  a  domestic  and  educational 
character.  In  connection  with  this  point  we  highly 
commend  the  contemplated  change  of  place  and  char 
acter  in  the  Pennsylvania  Reform  School,  which  is  to 
be  removed  from  Allegheny  City  to  a  large  farm, — the 
family  system  in  lieu  of  the  congregate  having  been 
adopted,  and  the  inmates  instructed  in  agricultural 
work.  The  tilling  of  the  soil  offers  in  this  country  the 
surest  chance  of  employment  and  the  certain  removal 
to  a  distance  from  the  temptations  of  city  life.  The 
percentage  of  children  trained  into  good  citizens  by 
these  schools  is  set  down  at  sixty  at  the  lowest.  These 
reformatory  schools  are  intended,  however,  only  for  the 
treatment  of  the  real  or  quasi  criminal.  There  is  a 
large  number  of  children  in  them  whose  sole  fault  is  a 
refractory  temper  or  vagrancy,  and  whose  association 
with  the  openly  vicious  can  only  result  in  their  cor 
ruption. 

This  class  and  the  swarms  of  youthful  beggars  out 
side  of  the  schools  have  offered  a  sad  and  terrible 
problem  for  the  consideration  of  thoughtful  men  in 
every  country.  The  problem  has  been  solved  in  Scot 
land,  England,  and  in  some  parts  of  our  own  country, 
by  what  means  and  with  what  success  a  few  brief  state 
ments  will  effectually  demonstrate. 

The  first  industrial  school  was  opened  in  the  loft  of  a 


EDUCATION.  83 

blacksmith's  forge,  in  Aberdeen,  under  the  direction  of 
Sheriff  Watson,  who  originated  the  plan  in  1841,  "with 
half  a  dozen  boys  dragged  in  by  the  police."  The  re 
sults  of  the  industrial  school  system  thus  established 
were  :  — 

1840.  1870. 

Children  supported  by  theft  or  beggary,  .    .    .           280  None. 

Adult  vagrants  in  rural  districts  for  five  years,        2,230  349 

Children,    ................            370  79 


Thefts  reported  from  1845  to  l&5°>  one  thousand 
one  hundred  and  forty-two;  1865  to  1870,  three  hun 
dred  and  sixty-one. 

These  schools  in  Aberdeen  were  the  prototypes  of 
all  industrial  schools  in  Great  Britain.  In  order  to 
insure  the  attendance  of  the  street  Arabs,  dependent 
for  food  on  their  own  thefts  or  begging,  a  soup  kitchen 
was  attached  to  the  schools  and  the  police  were  author 
ized  to  arrest  all  children  begging  and  bring  them  in. 

Reformatory  schools  received  the  sanction  of  Parlia 
ment,  in  Great  Britain,  in  1853,  and  industrial  schools 
in  1854.  By  subsequent  acts  they  were  placed  under 
the  control  of  the  home  office,  and  an  allowance 
granted,  per  capita,  for  the  education  and  maintenance 
of  the  inmates.  There  were  one  hundred  of  the  cer 
tified  industrial  schools  in  1872  in  successful  operation 
in  England  and  Scotland,  under  control  of  different 
religious  or  charitable  associations,  and  they  are  sup 
ported  in  part  by  voluntary  contributions,  by  govern 
ment  grant,  by  payment  from  parents,  who  send  their 
children  voluntarily,  and  by  profits  in  the  industrial 
department. 


84  EDUCATION. 

In  some  of  these  schools  the  children  are  fed  during 
the  day  and  return  to  their  homes  at  night ;  in  others 
they  are  fed,  clothed,  and  lodged.  The  children  are 
governed  by  the  family  system,  educated  as  their  future 
position  requires,  and  trained  to  be  practical  farmers, 
sailors,  shoemakers,  carpenters,  bakers,  weavers,  &c. 

The  girls  are  educated  in  the  use  of  the  needle  and 
sewing-machine,  in  laundry  work,  cooking,  house 
wifery,  &c. 

The  total  number  admitted  into  these  schools 
amounted  at  the  last  official  returns  to  25,376.  Of 
those  discharged,  the  percentage  was — 


Boys. 

Girls. 

Doing  well, 

75.2 

73.7 

Doubtful,    

6.18 

8.8 

Convicted 

7.1-2  • 

2.2 

Unknown 

I  -5.  "2 

i?.  6 

Died,  

2.2 

2.q 

In  1856,  before  the  reformatory  and  industrial  sys 
tem  was  put  into  operation,  the  number  of  commit 
ments  to  prison  of  children  under  sixteen  was  13,981. 

In  1870,  with  a  fourteen  years  increase  of  population, 
the  commitments  were  9998. 

Mr.  Barwick  Baker,  who  founded  the  first  reforma 
tory  school  in  England,  on  his  own  estate,  thus  testifies 
to  the  success  of  the  system : — 

"  In  Gloucester,  in  1844,  we  had  seven  jails  and  eight 
hundred  and  seventy  persons.  In  1872,  we  have  pulled 
down  six  out  of  the  seven,  and  have  but  one  hundred 
and  seventy  inmates  in  that." 


EDUCATION. 


An  example  of  the  benefit  derived  from  a  system  of 
industrial  schools,  differing  in  detail  from  those  in  Eng 
land,  is  found  near  at  hand. 

In  1852  and  1853,  special  attention  was  directed  in 
the  city  of  New  York  to  the  subject  of  juvenile  va 
grancy  and  crime,  and  associations  were  formed  for  the 
prevention  of  crime.  The  machinery  put  in  motion  by 
these  societies  were  industrial  schools  and  the  removal 
of  children  to  homes  in  the  West.  Of  these  schools 
thirty-six  are  maintained  by  one  society  alone.  The 
aggregate  attendance  at  the  whole  of  them  reaches 
13,606. 

The  action  of  these  associations  is  unaided  by  the 
State,  and  unenforced  by  law.  There  is,  therefore,  a 
lack  of  thoroughness  and  force  in  the  system  which 
that  of  Great  Britain  possesses,  yet  the  result  in  ten 
years  of  their  vigorous  and  humane  efforts,  which  we 
append  below,  is  startling  in  its  success. 


Arrests  for  vagrancy, 


1860. 

Girls. 


2, 


1871. 

Girls. 


Arrests  for   petty  larceny,  

J7 
QCQ 

o 

82? 

Decrease,    

3^79 
1,858 

i,3« 

1860. 
Girls. 

1870. 

Girls. 

Commitments   for  vagrancy, 

5,880 

671 

Commitments   for  petty  larceny,  

800 

746 

Decrease, 

6,770 

.5,3.53 

1,417 

86 


EDUCATION. 


1860. 

Boys. 

1870. 
Boys. 

Arrests 

for 

vagrancy. 

i,  800 

I    ^^I 

Arrests 

for 

pocket-picking 

4O  7 

^JOO-1- 

46—1871 

Arrests 

for 

petty    larceny, 

2,087 

•7     I7T 

O>  A  /  A 

5,194  [4,548 


1860. 

Boys. 

1870. 

Boys. 

Commitments    for 

vagrancy,  

2,708 

1,^78 

Commitments    for 

petty  larceny,  

2.C7C 

2,241 

5>283 

3.619 

According  to  the  increase  of  population,  the  increase 
of  crime  should  have  been  twenty  per  cent.,  instead  of 
which  the  commitments  of  girls  for  vagrancy,  as  we  see, 
diminished  in  ten  years  five  thousand.  "  Nothing,'* 
says  Mr.  Brace,  who  presents  this  record,  "  can  account 
for  this  diminution  of  crime  but  moral  and  preventive 
measures ;  for  during  that  time  a  terrible  war  has  oc 
curred  with  all  its  necessary  evils,  and  several  panics 
and  prostrations  of  business." 

We  need  adduce  no  further  proof  of  the  efficiency 
of  the  plan  which  we  propose,  viz.,  that  industrial 
schools  shall  be  introduced  and  assisted  by  the  State. 
The  support  of  a  child  in  one  of  these,  as  we  stated  in 
our  last  report,  will  cost  the  State  twenty  dollars  per 
annum.  The  support  of  the  same  child  matured  into  a 
criminal  will  cost  her  $200  per  annum.  "  Our  system 
of  industrial  schools,"  says  a  Swede,  "is  costly,  but  not 
dear.  We  cannot  afford  to  let  a  child  grow  up  in 
ignorance  and  vice." 

Still   less  can   we  afford  it  when  the  ignorant  and 


EDUCATION.  87 

vicious  adult  will  shortly  help  to  make  the  laws  which 
are  to  govern  us. 

The  plan  we  offer  is  neither  costly  nor  difficult. 
Considered  from  the  lowest  point  of  view,  that  of 
economy,  by  the  statistics  given  above,  it  will  save  the 
Commonwealth  in  ten  years  the  expense  of  at  least 
one-third  of  her  present  number  of  criminals;  con 
sidered  in  regard  to  its  humane  aspects,  we  believe  it 
to  offer  the  only  means,  at  once  rational  and  Christian, 
by  which  the  seething  mass  of  ignorance  and  crime 
which  underlies  society,  here  as  elsewhere,  may  be 
reached,  and  greatly  reduced  or  wholly  eradicated. 

Profoundly  impressed  by  the  truth  of  the  sugges 
tions  which  we  have  made  to  your  honorable  bodies 
on  this  highly  important  subject,  this  board  has  ven 
tured  to  prepare  a  bill  for  your  consideration,  which 
will  not  only  effect  the  purpose  of  the  suggestions,  but 
which  will  also  establish  an  impartial  and  uniform 
system  respecting  all  those  classes  of  institutions  which 
provide  for  the  maintenance  and  education  of  destitute 
and  neglected  children. 

We  append  to  our  report  on  this  subject  a  state 
ment  of  the  numbers,  ages,  &c.,  of  the  inmates  of  the 
two  houses  of  refuge  or  reform  schools  in  the  State. 

STATE    REFORMATORIES. 

Of  this  class  of  institutions  there  are  two  in  Penn 
sylvania,  viz.,  the  Philadelphia  House  of  Refuge,  and 
the  Pennsylvania  Reform  School  in  Allegheny  county. 
The  number  of  juvenile  delinquents  confined  in  them 


88 


EDUCATION. 


on    September    3Oth,    1874,   was    respectively   as   fol 
lows: — 


SEX  AND  COLOR. 

House  of 
Refuge. 

Reform 
School. 

Recapitula 
tion. 

White  boys,    

•271 

2OO 

^71 

White  girls,    

o  /  A 

87 

66 

0  /  x 
1C? 

Total  white 

/u8 

266 

72  A 

Colored  boys,    

*r3V 

00 

2C 

**t 

I  24 

Colored  girls,     ... 

40 

J 
IO 

CTQ 

jw 

Total  colored,    

139 

35 

174 

Aggregate  of  white  and  colored, 

597 

301 

898 

The  number  in  both  institutions  on  September  3Oth, 
1874,  was  eight  hundred  and  ninety-eight,  the  white 
being  in  proportion  to  the  colored  as  eighty-one  to 
nineteen.  It  will  be  observed  that  but  few  colored 
delinquents  are  confined  in  the  "Reform  School,"  their 
proportion  to  the  white  being  but  twelve  to  eighty- 
eight.  In  the  "House  of  Refuge, "  which  has  a  special 
department  for  the  colored  inmates,  we  find  that  their 
ratio  to  the  white  is  as  twenty-three  to  seventy-seven. 
The  average  age  of  those  committed  during  the  year 
was  13.9  years,  or  white  delinquent  14.5  years;  colored, 
1 3. 4  years. 


LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF 

CALIFORNIA. 


PRISON   ECONOMY 


PRISON    DISCIPLINE. 

PRISON  discipline  is  one  branch  of  the  science  of 
government,  and,  like  every  other  department  of  that 
science,  it  is  progressive.  New  ideas  respecting  its 
purposes  and  new  methods  of  reducing  them  to  prac 
tice  will,  of  course,  be  developed  by  patient  observa 
tion  of  facts  and  careful  deduction  of  the  principles 
which  they  teach. 

The  moral  and  physical  evils  of  incarceration  have 
been  much  abated  as  Christianity  and  civilization 
have  advanced.  Prisons  are  spoken  of  as  existing  at 
the  times  of  the  patriarchs,  seventeen  hundred  years 
before  the  Christian  era;  but  it  is  believed  that  they 
did  not  become  an  established  part  of  the  organism 
of  the  state  until  the  rise  of  the  baronial  or  feudal  sys 
tem,  in  the  tenth  and  eleventh  centuries.  A  writer 
says  : — "  The  prison,  as  we  know  it,  is  as  entirely  an  in 
stitution  of  modern  Europe  as  the  church,  the  school, 
and  the  poor-house.  Words  occur  connected  with 
events  and  customs  in  the  eastern  world  which  we  can 
only  translate  into  modern  language  or  thought  by  the 
use  of  the  word  'prison;'  but  the  thing,  as  we  now 
know  it,  in  the  shape  of  the  county  jail  or  the  convict 

(89) 


90  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

prison,  was,  then,  neither  known  nor  anticipated.  A  sys 
tematic  committal  to  prison,  as  a  specific  punishment,  is 
a  thing  of  which  it  may  be  safely  said  that  no  trace  can 
be  found  in  the  practices  of  ancient  nations  that  have 
come  down  to  us."  In  early  times  "prisons"  were  often 
excavations  in  the  earth,  encased  with  solid  masonry,  or 
dug  out  in  the  living  rock,  and  men  were  dropped  into 
them  as  into  huge  bottles,  or  placed  in  recesses  in  the 
sides  and  built  in  with  stone  and  mortar,  to  drag  out  a 
miserable  and,  sometimes,  protracted  existence ;  death 
offering  the  only  hope  of  relief. 

In  despotic  countries,  the  policy  of  the  government 
has  often  been  to  cut  off  all  facilities  for  the  identifica 
tion  of  prisoners.  When  they  fell  into  the  hands  of 
power  they  lost  all  connection  with  the  living  world, 
and  their  actual  death  was  known  only  to  the  subal 
terns  to  whose  keeping  they  were  committed. 

In  the  reign  of  Louis  XIV.  ( one  of  a  race  of  kings 
who  assumed  that  states  existed  for  the  support  of 
royalty  in  luxury  and  self-indulgence )  the  French 
Parliament  was  aroused  to  do  something  for  the  pro 
tection  from  the  law's  delay  of  persons  seized  and  in 
carcerated  on  charges  (sometimes  altogether  futile  and 
malicious)  for  which  they  had  not  been  tried,  and  to 
secure  for  their  cases  an  early  investigation ;  and  at 
length  extorted  a  promise  that  the  case  of  every  im 
prisoned  person  should  have  judical  cognizance  within 
twenty-four  hours  after  his  arrest.  But  the  fact  of  im 
prisonment  without  trial,  and  often  without  guilt,  was 
scarcely  a  greater  cruelty  there  and  elsewhere  than 
the  treatment  of  those  adjudged  guilty  and  sentenced 
to  incarceration. 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  91 

In  the  reign  of  George  II.,  through  lack  of  govern 
mental  control,  and  the  irresponsibility  of  the  wardens 
of  prisons,  greater  cruelties  were  practiced  than  were    v 
common  under  the  most  absolute  despots.      Hogarth's    \ 
picture  of  the  grated  window  in  one  of  the  dungeons 
of  Fleet  street,  records  better  than  words  of  descrip 
tion  the  miseries  of  imprisonment  in  his  time. 

When  these  outrages  were  exposed,  Parliament  com 
mitted  itself  so  far  to  their  correction,  that  the  prison- 
keepers  became  more  cautious,  and  abstained  from  the 
infliction  of  unlawful  cruelties.  But  the  very  prisons 
themselves  were  so  constructed  as  to  be  instruments 
of  mental  and  physical  torture  to  their  inmates,  and 
so  continued  until  the  time  of  Howard.  At  that  very 
period  the  prisons  of  the  Dutch  (shame  to  our  English 
ancestors !)  far  excelled  theirs  in  order,  cleanliness, 
and  industry,  and  were  nearly  assimilated  in  these 
respects  to  the  best  establishments  of  modern  times. 
But  the  pre-eminent  evil  of  the  English  provision  for 
the  care  of  prisoners,  even  to  so  late  a  period  as 
the  year  1859,  was  the  promiscuous  mingling  of  cul 
prits,  great  and  small.  The  corrupting  influence  of 
such  a  system  can  hardly  be  overstated.  The  most 
atrocious  and  hardened  criminals,  with  such  facilities, 
impart  their  own  measure  and  type  of  iniquity  to 
novices  in  vice,  so  that  the  higher  measure  of  wicked 
ness  is  often  reached  by  these  latter  almost  at  a  bound. 

Even  now,  in  most  countries,  while  the  supreme 
authority  has  some  oversight,  and,  at  will,  exercises 
some  restraining  power  upon  the  inferior  officers  of 
justice,  so  that  they  are  liable  to  be  checked  in  the 
pursuit  of  any  arbitrary  or  vindictive  courses,  yet  there 


92  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

is  no  hand  to  lay  restraint  upon  the  chief  executive 
himself,  and  to  protect  the  prisoner  against  his  caprices 
or  mistakes.  England  and  the  United  States  possess 
the  habeas  corpus  act.  These  are  the  only  countries 
in  which  is  any  power,  adequate  to  the  object,  that  can 
interpose  between  the  ruler  and  the  alleged  culprit  and 
i — open  the  prison  doors. 

These  are  steps  in  the  way  of  righteous  dealing 
towards  those  who  have  fallen  under  the  condemna 
tion  of  the  law,  which  do  not  arrest  the  course  of 
justice,  but  only  secure  its  equal  administration.  They 
are  tokens  of  a  higher  civilization,  and  of  a  Christianity 
which  has  leavened  even  the  civil  economy  of  the 
state. 

The  reformation  of  the  prisoner  is  now,  in  enlight 
ened  communities,  no  less  an  object  of  incarceration 
than  is  punishment :  so  that,  in  great  measure,  reforma 
tories  and  prisons  are  kindred  institutions.  The  diffi 
cult  problem  which  we  are  now  most  concerned  to 
,  solve  is,  how  to  maintain  the  condign  severity  of  the 
law,  and  yet  to  encourage  the  culprit  to  attempt,  with 
a  hopeful  spirit,  a  new  and  more  honorable  mode  of 
life.  He  must  never  be  suffered  to  forget  that  he  is 
under  the  rebuke  of  society  for  his  crime.  To  his  pro 
clivities  for  self-indulgence  and  evil  company,  the  prison 
should  in  no  wise  give  indulgence.  Restraint  must  be  \ 
a  present  consciousness  all  the  time.  Constraint  to  meer 
reasonable  exactions  of  work,  and  of  punctuality  and 
obedience  to  rule,  must  be  as  certainly  a  part  of  his 
daily  regimen  as  the  supply  of  his  frugal  and  homely 
meals.  And  yet,  in  the  exercise  of  this  quiet  strictness 
and  severity,  there  should  be  always  in  the  administra- 


ECONOMY.  93 

tion  the  spontaneous  evidences  of  humanity,  and,  in  the 
apprehension  of  the  culprit,  the  sense  that  simple 
justice  is  dealt  out  to  him.  Facilities  for  improvement 
must  be  given ;  commendation  on  duties  well  per 
formed  kindly  bestowed ;  and  the  possibilities  of  a 
better  life,  in  after  years,  suggested  and  put  within  the 
reach  of  hope.  No  merely  hireling  functionary  is  fit 
to  have  the  charge  of  imprisoned  culprits.  The  work 
of  a  warden  in  a  penitentiary  can  be  well  done  only  by 
one  who  believes  in  the  susceptibilities  of  manhood, 
even  when  brought  to  the  deepest  abasement,  and  who 
aspires  to  make  an  effort  to  lift  it  up  and  help  its 
restoration.  He  must  not  be  of  hasty  temper  or 
easily  discouraged,  but  must  pursue  his  undertaking 
with  a  quenchless  zeal  and  perform  his  work  in  the 
same  spirit  of  sacrifice  with  which  a  missionary  of 
religion  leaves  his  country  and  gives  his  life  to  the  re 
claiming  of  men  groping  in  the  darkness  and  degrada 
tion  of  heathenism. 

To  secure  this  manner  and  spirit  of  administration 
the  most  vigilant  oversight  is  required.  Very  much  of 
what  transpires  in  the  various  public  institutions  of  our 
country  is  secure  enough  from  actual  abuse  by  the 
publicity  of  their  proceedings.  Times  of  free  visita 
tion  are  appointed,  at  which  whosoever  will  may  pass 
through  them  and  inspect  their  arrangements.  And 
this  public  supervision,  supplemented  by  the  official 
inspection  of  their  board  of  managers,  affords  an  ordi 
narily  effective  mode  of  bringing  to  light  any  grievous 
wrongs  that  are  practiced  upon  their  inmates.  But  the 
walls  of  prisons  are  as  effectual  in  keeping  critics  out 
as  in  keeping  culprits  in.  It  is  especially  desirable  that 


94  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

impartial  men,  holding  office  not  for  fee  or  reward,  but 
from  motives  of  philanthropy  alone,  appointed  by  an 
authority  which  shall  possess  the  highest  confidence  for 
its  wisdom  and  its  independence,  should  be  invested 
with  powers  of  oversight  and  direction,  enabling  them 
to  look  into  the  inner  prisons  and  the  whole  economy  of 
treatment  and  the  animus  with  which  it  is  conducted. 

In  his  first  report,  after  the  adoption  of  our  Pennsyl 
vania  system  of  separate  imprisonment,  the  chief  offi 
cer  having  oversight  of  such  matters  in  England 
wrote  : — "  I  find  the  result  at  present  to  be  not  only  the 
entire  suppression  of  the  corrupt  and  demoralizing 
effects  of  indiscriminate  association,  but  a  peculiar 
seriousness  of  demeanor  is  produced  by  separate  con 
finement,  which,  except  in  a  few  instances,  I  never  wit 
nessed  before." 

Isolated  and  temporary  experiments  of  the  solitary 
system  had  been  attempted  in  Great  Britain  before ;  as 
in  the  Gloucester  Penitentiary,  near  the  close  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  and  afterwards,  in  a  modified  shape, 
in  the  Bridewell  of  Glasgow. 

In  1786,  through  the  influence  of  the  Society  of 
Friends,  the  solitary  system  was  distinctly  developed 
in  the  management  of  the  prison  in  Philadelphia.  All 
punishments  of  a  corporal  nature,  such  as  branding 
and  the  lash,  were  at  the  same  time  abolished.  Altera 
tions  were  made  in  the  Walnut  Street  Prison  with  re 
ference  to  this  new  regime.  Thirty  cells  were  set 
apart  for  separate  confinement.  Continuous  solitude, 
without  labor,  books,  or  manual  occupatiorTof  any  sort, 
was  at  first  enforced.  And  the  same  system  was 
adopted,  in  some  degree,  by  Maryland,  Massachusetts, 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  95 

Maine,  New  Jersey,  and  Virginia.  But  perpetual  soli 
tude  was  found  to  be  unendurable,  unless  some  em 
ployment  might  be  given.  A  culprit,  having  small 
resources  of  knowledge,  and,  therefore,  meagre  mate 
rial  for  thought,  shut  up  to  brood  only  upon  his  folly 
and  crime  and  punishment,  will,  if  of  passionate  tem 
perament,  be  driven  to  insanity,  and,  if  of  sluggish 
mould,  will  sink  into  idiocy.  Labor  interrupts  and 
mitigates  the  anguish  of  remembered  guilt  and  its 
tribulation.  The  hands  can  do  nothing  unless  the 

o 

mind  be  more  or  less  engaged  in  directing  their  move 
ments,  and  any  diversion  of  the  thoughts  from  one 
perpetual,  painful  subject  of  reflection,  is  an  unspeak 
able  relief.  It  is  the  law  of  our  intellectual,  as  it  is  of 
our  physical,  nature,  that  if  some  faculties  be  withheld 
from  exercise,  others  are  intensified  into  abnormal 
power  and  activity.  As,  if  the  eyes  be  blinded,  the 
hearing  becomes  more  acute;  so,  if  the  operative  func 
tions  of  the  mind  be  repressed,  the  reflective  action  is 
excessively  and  morbidly  increased.  He  who  cannot 
apply  his  thoughts  to  any  matter  of  present  interest, 
recoils  upon  the  past  with  a  fearful  energy  of  memory, 
of  which  men  in  their  natural  freedom  of  observation 
and  action  are  incapable.  The  American  experiment, 
which,  separating  prisoners  from  one  another,  modified 
the  severity  of  such  solitude  by  requiring  them  to 
labor,  gave  the  first  demonstration  of  the  value  of 
those  two  elements  in  prison  discipline. 

But  laboiMs  advantageous  not  only  in  that  it  makes 
solitary  confinement  endurable,  but  that  it  teaches,  what 
most  criminals  have  never  learned,  the  duty  of  service. 
41  Idleness  is  the  parent  of  vice."  A  little  investigation 


96  PX1SON  ECONOMY. 

would  convince  any  one  that  in  nearly  every  instance 
the  crimes  which  consign  men  to  prison  have  been  com 
mitted  by  those  who  have  never  acquired  habits  of 
industry, — who  have  either  obtained  a  precarious  liveli 
hood  by  leaning  on  others  for  support  or  by  occasional 
spasms  of  effort  to  work,  or  have  lazily,  with  perpetual 
reluctance,  and  with  evasion  of  duty  whenever  possible, 
maintained  a  sham  occupation.  For  such  men,  espe 
cially  if  they  reach  prison  (the  goal  of  crime)  early  in 
life,  steady,  compulsory  labor  is  a  most  wholesome  dis 
cipline.  Industry  becomes  thus  a  necessity  of  their 
situation,  both  because  irresistible  authority  exacts  it  of 
them,  and  because,  in  solitude,  their  own  comfort  of 
mind  requires  it.  It  is  the  nearest  approach  they  have 
to  positive  pleasure,  and  so  it  grows  to  be  agreeable, 
until  a  diligence  which  began  under  constraint  at  length 
ripens  into  a  habit.  The  criminal  who,  paying  the  pen 
alty  of  a  past  offense,  gains  meanwhile  this  item  of 
personal  training,  for  the  lack  of  which  he  became  a 
criminal,  returns  to  the  world,  when  his  sentence  of  in 
carceration  is  fulfilled,  a  wiser  and  a  better  man,  imbued 
with  such  new  ideas  of  life  that,  through  industry,  he 
will  escape  relapse  into  crimes.  But  prison  labor,  to 
be  beneficial  in  its  effect  upon  the  prisoner,  must  be 
productive.  The  crank  and  the  tread-mill  only  weary 
the  body  and  vex  the  spirit.  Where  a  particle  of  man 
hood  remains,  the  soul  revolts  at  a  mere  muscular  oc 
cupation,  which  gives  no  exercise  to  the  understanding, 
and  might  as  well  be  done  by  an  ox  or  an  ass.  These 
inflictions  are  merely  penal.  Dr.  Wines  reports  of  a 
recent  visit  to  the  city  prison  of  London,  where  as 
many  as  seven  or  eight  hundred  of  the  inmates  were 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  97 

found  "  exercising""  on  the  tread-wheel,  which  is  the 
largest  in  the  world : — "  The  governor  of  the  prison 
testifies  to  the  bad  effects  of  this  kind  of  prison  labor." 
They  humble  the  transgressor,  indeed,  but  they  destroy 
his  self-respect.  They  may  serve  to  make  the  prison 
odious,  and  thus  operate  to  make  the  viciously-inclined 
more  careful  to  avoid  it,  but  they  do  him  no  good — 
rather  positive  harm,  when  once  he  is  lodged  in  prison 
as  a  culprit. 

The  system  of  separate  imprisonment,  with  useful 
labor,  avoids  alike  the  danger  of  contamination  by  the 
intercourse  of  the  bad  with  the  worse,  and  the  danger 
of  insanity  or  imbecility  when  the  guilty  are  kept  idle 
and  alone.  Under  the  old  common-jail  arrangement 
the  novice  in  crime  was  almost  sure  to  go  forth,  when 
discharged,  an  adept.  The  leisure  allowed  in  the 
prison-yards,  and  in  the  rooms  where  culprits  were 
herded  together,  was  employed  in  recounting  past  ex 
ploits  in  crime  and  hair-breadth  escapes,  and  in  plan 
ning  future  acts  of  villainy ;  so  that,  not  infrequently, 
men  were  graduated  from  these  schools  of  vice  with  a 
programme  of  further  depredations  upon  society  care 
fully  prepared  and  determined  on. 

To  preclude  communication  between  prisoners  is  the 
paramount  idea  of  the  separate  system.  It  does  not 
contemplate  the  exclusion  of  ministers  of  religion  ac 
cording  to  the  denominational  preferences  of  those  in 
confinement ;  they  may  come  to  the  wretched  exile  as 
often  as  his  spiritual  wants  require.  It  does  not  hin 
der  the  access  of  other  conscientious  persons  whom  it 
may  be  agreeable  and  edifying  for  them  to  see.  In 
some  places  it  is  not  thought  to  impair  the  efficacy  of 


98  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

this  system  to  allow  the  prisoners  to  meet  for  worship 
and  instruction.  In  the  Western  Penitentiary  of  this 
State,  under  a  recent  law,  prisoners  come  together  for 
labor,  restricted,  however,  from  all  conversation  with 
one  another. 

This  absolute  prevention  of  all  intercourse  between 
the  vicious,  and  exclusion  of  all  outside  visitors  except 
those  who  come  to  lead  them  to  repentance  and  a 
better  life,  must  add  great  moral  force  to  the  influences 
of  religious  truth  with  which  they  are  approached. 
The  privacy  of  these  errands  of  mercy  gives  the 
consciously  guilty  encouragement  to  unburden  his 
heart,  and  to  indulge  and  express  feelings  of  contri 
tion,  without  the  danger  of  being  scoffed  at  for  his 
weakness.  If  there  be  any  tender  memories,  they  are 
likely  to  be  awakened  and  made  impressive  and  profit 
able  under  such  circumstances.  And  besides,  undis- 
tracted  by  other  objects  of  interest  and  topics  of 
conversation,  the  mind  of  a  prisoner,  judiciously  guided 
by  conscientious  advisers  and  concentrated  upon  the 
recovery  of  a  lost  relation  of  amity  with  God  and  man, 
will  most  surely  reach  wise  and  abiding  conclusions. 

The  dietary  arrangements  of  a  prison  may  be  made 
to  promote  its  reformatory  influences.  A  large  pro 
portion  of  those  who  are  incarcerated  as  criminals  have 
before  imprisonment  led  dissolute  lives.  Addicted  to 
intoxicating  drinks,  their  food  has  been,  for  the  most 
part,  poor  and  innutritious  and  taken  at  irregular  times. 
Surfeited  occasionally  with  inordinate  quantities  of 
hearty  food,  and  then  almost  starved  by  its  meagreness 
and  infrequency,  they  become  worn  and  sickly,  and 
ordinarily  improve  in  bodily  condition  after  they  are 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  99 

put  in  durance.  This  improvement  results  partially 
from  the  uniformity  of  material  of  their  food,  and  of 
the  times  at  which  they  receive  it.  It  is  attributable, 
also,  in  some  degree,  to  the  constrained  inactivity  of 
their  lives.  And  so  it  often  happens  that  improved  in 
health  prisoners  come  out  at  the  expiration  of  their 
sentence  presenting  an  appearance  not  only  in  ludicrous 
contrast  with  that  which  they  wore  when  taken  into 
custody,  but  more  indicative  of  good  living  than  the 
aspect  of  honest  laborers,  who  have  earned,  at  liberty, 
the  means  of  their  daily  subsistence.  A  difference  so 
marked  ought  not  to  appear,  lest  poverty  be  tempted 
to  crime  by  the  seemingly  better  fare  of  those  who 
have  been  convicted  of  it.  Culprits  should  not  be  too 
well  fed.  They  are  usually  persons  in  whom  the  ani 
mal  nature  is  predominant,  and  out  of  that  fact  their 
vices  have  grown.  Repletion  of  food  is  often  attended 
with  a  mental  indifference  to  other  things,  and  a  pride 
and  haughtiness  of  spirit  unfavorable  to  moral  im 
provement.  Nor,  on  the  other  hand,  should  the  prison 
be  used  as  a  place  of  physical  torture  by  the  withhold 
ing  of  necessary  food.  It  is  a  nice  point  to  be  fixed 
upon,  and  it  should  be  determined  after  the  most 
careful  observation,  and  the  exercise  of  the  highest 
professional  skill.  What  is  the  lowest  quantity  of 
plain  food  which  will  preserve  a  human  being,  in  his 
normal  condition,  is  the  law  of  subsistence  which  should 
find  place  in  prison  economy.  A  certain  measure  of 
abstinence  is  not  unfavorable  to  the  best  dicipline  of 
the  spirit. 

Truth  is  better  apprehended  when  the  body  has  not 
been  satiated  with  overmuch  food  ;  the  carnal  passions 


100  PJKISON  ECONOMY. 

are  less  likely  to  predominate.  Such  experience  is  a 
hint  for  the  management  of  those  who,  by  the  indul 
gence  of  wicked  propensities,  have  become  dangerous 
to  the  community,  and  are  in  its  hands  for  chastise 
ment  and  reform.  The  regimen  of  their  subsistence 
should  be  such,  that  without  detriment  to  the  physical 
constitution,  their  whole  nature  should  be  kept  in  the 
best  condition  for  receiving  and  appropriating  what 
ever  good  and  reformatory  influences  may  be  brought 
to  bear  upon  them.  Especially  should  there  be  avoid 
ance  of  such  dietary  profusion  as  could  by  any  possi 
bility  make  the  prison  a  place  of  chosen  refuge  for 
the  idle  and  thriftless  drones  of  society. 


BENEVOLENCE    IN    PUNISHMENT   AND    IN    PRO 
VISION    FOR   THE  POOR. 

Society  needs  to  realize  more  sensibly  than  it  now 
does  that  benevolence,  not  only  towards  the  stricken 
and  unfortunate,  but  towards  the  vicious  who  fall  into 
its  custody,  is  both  its  duty  and  its  interest.  And  they 
who  serve  society  as  custodians  of  these  classes  need 
still  more  to  feel  it  and  to  practice  it  in  the  administra 
tion  of  their  trusts.  The  perfunctory  and  heartless 
care  of  human  beings,  whether  in  asylums  or  prisons, 
is  a  deprivation  of  that  ameliorating  influence  of  sym 
pathy  which  is  at  once  the  right  of  the  persons  in  ward, 
and  the  interest  of  the  community  which  has  them  to 
provide  for. 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  IOI 

In  suggesting  a  benevolent  administration  of  justice 
even  to  convicted  criminals,  we  would  not  be  under 
stood  as  favoring  that  weak  lenity  which  would  deprive 
discipline  of  all  its  punitive  power.  The  hope  of 
evading  arrest,  and,  if  arrested,  of  escaping  conviction  ; 
the  relief  from  wearisome  labor,  and  the  certainty  of 
good  fare  in  prison,  the  chances  of  having  the  term  of 
incarceration  shortened  by  executive  clemency,  strip 
our  penal  code  of  almost  all  its  terrors.  Through  one 
or  more  of  these  loopholes  the  minions  of  vice  take 
assurance  that  they  shall  escape  from  the  full  measure 
of  punishment  which  the  law  decrees,  and  so  they 
venture  on  crime  with  the  chances,  as  they  think,  in 
their  favor.  Certainly  if  condign  punishment  would 
be  a  proximate  preventive  of  crime,  uninviting  but 
wholesome  food,  labor  enough  to  produce  daily  fatigue, 
strict  but  perfectly  humane  treatment,  should  be  the 
experience  of  every  convict.  In  dealing  with  crime, 
the  public  should  aim,  not  only  at  its  own  protection 
by  placing  the  guilty  under  restraint,  but  also  at  the 
moral  reformation  of  the  offender,  if  for  no  other 
reason,  for  this,  that  wThen  released  he  may  be  of  some 
service  to  society  by  his  influence  and  his  industry, 
rather  than  infect  it  with  the  pestilence  of  his  vices  and 
weaken  it  by  his  depredations,  intensified  by  hatred  and 
vindictiveness  engendered  through  what  he  conceives 
to  be  the  despotism  of  his  restraining  imprisonment. 

The  family  relation  is  the  natural  one,  and  should  be 
the  type  of  those  larger  communities  which  result  from 
the  commercial  habits  of  mankind.  The  state  is  a 
great  family,  and  the  animus  of  its  administration 
should  accord  with  that  idea.  The  father,  in  no  stage 


102  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

of  his  child's  waywardness  and  alienation,  may  forget 
his  parental  bonds.  He  deals  most  wisely  with  a  rec 
reant  child  who,  not  sparing  the  rod  of  chastisement, 
makes  his  offspring  to  feel,  at  every  stroke,  that  he  is 
smarting,  not  under  the  malignant  vengeance  of  out 
raged  power,  but  under  the  effort  of  aggrieved  love  to 
enforce  the  conviction  that  the  way  of  the  transgressor 
is  hard,  and  to  bring  back  the  offender  to  duty  and 
reconciliation. 

No  one,  put  in  durance  by  the  strong  hand  of  society, 
unless,  perhaps,  he  has  committed  that  extreme  offense 
by  which  the  sentence  of  death  is  incurred,  should  be 
made  to  esteem  himself  an  utter  and  hopeless  outcast, 
whom  all  men  are  conspiring  to  hunt  down.  When  it 
appears  that  nobody  else  has  a  vestige  of  hope  that  a 
man  may  be  reclaimed,  he,  himself,  loses  all  hope  and 
abandons  all  effort  of  amendment.  What  is  wanted  in 
prison  discipline  is,  not  a  mawkish  tenderness,  not  a 
weak  consideration  for  prisoners,  as  if  they  were  mere 
unfortunates;  but  a  gracious  humanity  which  recog 
nizes  manhood  as  still  existent  in  the  vilest  culprit,  and 
would  fain  do  something  to  bring  it  out  of  degrading 
bondage,  and  restore  it  to  supremacy.  The  manual  of 
our  religious  faith  teaches,  that  while  the  Supreme  per 
mits  a  transgressor  to  live,  He  continues  to  him  the 
power  and  the  opportunity  to  return  and  forsake  his 
evil  ways. 

But  if  it  be  both  just  and  politic  to  deal  even  with 
criminals  in  a  humane  and  merciful  spirit,  how  much 
rather  should  they  be  stimulated  with  manifestations  of 
sympathy  and  encouragement  to  effort,  who  have  been 
disabled,  by  the  visitation  of  God,  from  earning  their 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  103 

own  living,  and  are  unwillingly  forced  upon  the  com 
munity  for  maintenance.  We  now  speak  of  the  worthy 
paupers,  not  the  professional  who  oscillate  between 
the  county  jail  and  the  county  almshouse,  infected  with 
a  double  degradation.  We  may  concede  that  the  care 
less  lenity  which  so  generally  indulges  these  consuming 
lazzaroni,  with  abundant  provision  and  light  labor,  is  to 
be  deprecated,  offering,  as  it  does,  a  premium  for  idle 
ness  and  vice.  If  such  be  proper  subjects  for  public 
maintenance,  they  should  be  sternly  taught,  that  "  if 
they  will  not  work,  neither  shall  they  eat." 

The  unfortunate  and  the  guilty  are  all  alike  integral 
parts  of  the  community.  Whatever  dejects  them,  en 
feebles  it.  The  effective  force  of  society  is  made  up  of 
the  power  of  its  individual  members,  and  the  confi 
dence  of  each  in  all,  is  one  of  the  elements  of  that 
power.  The  deterioration  of  any  member  of  the  com 
munity,  even  though  he  be  a  pauper  or  criminal,  to  a 
certain  extent  lowers  the  moral  standard  of  the  whole. 
A  modern  English  writer  says  : — "  It  is  not  to  be  sup 
posed  that  the  criminal  population  is  a  creation  apart. 
No,  it  springs  from,  it  is  a  part  of,  the  community ;  it  is 
composed  of  the  weaker  and  more  excitable  part  of 
every  class. 

"The  weak,  the  careless,  the  vicious  of  every  class 
find  themselves  gradually  and  steadily  crushed  out  of 
the  conflict  for  that  wealth,  which  every  effort  made 
around  them  by  men  of  higher  capacities  than  their 
own,  tends  to  exalt  their  imagination,  while  it  removes 
them  from  its  legitimate  acquisition.  The  appetite  for 
wealth,  which  is  a  disease  even  among  the  educated 
and  high-toned  of  a  nation,  becomes  a  foul  leprosy  in 


104  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

that  portion  of  it,  in  whom  weakness  of  intellect  and 
strength  of  passions  have  not  found  a  compensating 
control  in  sound  education  and  early  training." 

Pauperism,  ^specially,  requires  to  be  lifted  out  of  the 
downward  steeps  of  hopelessness.  Our  self-respect  is 
largely  dependent  on  our  consciousness  that  others 
respect  us,  and  loss  of  self-respect  almost  certainly 
leads  its  desolate  victim  to  the  commission  of  crime. 
In  all  almshouses,  every  inmate  should  be  required  to 
exert  his  or  her  ability  to  labor,  however  feeble  it  be, 
and  to  that  end,  diversities  of  work  should  be  furnished 
adapted  to  their  individual  strength  and  skill.  And 
this  should  be  exacted,  not  as  a  burden  or  penalty, 
whose  tendency  would  be  still  further  to  crush  out  the 
manliness  of  its  victim,  but  as  a  stimulus  to  self-reliance 
and  a  proof  that  the  power  of  self-maintenance  may  be 
regained. 

This  we  submit  as  one  method  by  which  the  state, 
the  embodiment  and  executive  power  of  society,  may 
characterize  its  administration  of  those  departments  in 
the  great  household,  where  the  transgressing,  the  in 
efficient,  and  the  unfortunate  members  are  provided  for, 
under  rules  of  the  firmest  discipline,  but  by  a  generous 
and  wholesome  benevolence.  And  through  an  agency 
of  its  own  charged  with  this  mission,  and  imbued  with 
a  right  spirit,  it  is  believed  that  much  may  be  done  to 
repress  evil,  alleviate  misery,  and  promote  future  im 
provement  in  those  restraining  methods  and  influences 
which  are  now  in  practice. 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  105 

CRIME  AND  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

It  is  a  trite  maxim,  that  the  prevention  of  evil  is  bet 
ter  than  its  cure  ;  and  nowhere  is  the  maxim  more  true 
than  in  relation  to  crime.  To  destroy  its  seeds  or  hin 
der  their  germination — to  dry  up  its  sources  or  turn 
their  flow  into  some  harmless  or  useful  direction — to 
eradicate  or  neutralize  its  causes — is  better  than  all 
efforts  at  its  repression  or  even  its  reform.  It  is  easier, 
as  well  as  better,  to  throw  off  the  incipient  fever  than 
to  stay  its  full-grown  progress.  It  is  easier  and  wiser 
to  guard  against  or  extinguish  the  first  kindling  of  the 
fire  than  to  stem  the  sweeping  conflagration.  Both 
processes,  the  preventive  and  the  remedial,  will  always 
be  needed;  for  neither  disease  nor  conflagration  nor 
crime  will  ever  be  utterly  abolished  among  men ;  but 
each  process  should  be  applied  in  its  proper  place  and 
in  its  due  proportion.  In  the  former  reports  of  this 
board,  therefore,  attention  has  already  been  most  earn 
estly  called  to  the  unspeakable  importance  of  adopting 
effectual  measures  for  securing  the  universal  education 
of  the  young  in  learning,  industry,  and  good  morals; 
for  hindering  truancy  and  vagrancy,  idleness  and 
intemperance,  and  for  furnishing  the  destitute  poor 
with  such  shelter  and  support  as  may  preserve  them 
from  either  miserably  perishing  or  preying  upon  the 
peace  and  property  of  society,  as  well  as  giving  occa 
sion  to  still  greater  multitudes  of  idle  vagabonds  to 
impose  upon  its  charity.  Such  preventive  measures 
cannot  be  too  urgently  pressed  and  pushed  forward. 
They  are  the  most  humane,  the  most  beneficent,  the 
most  •effective,  and,  in  the  end,  they  will  prove  the 


106  PR 1 'SON  ECONOMY. 

cheapest.  Still,  measures  of  repression  and  reform, 
to  which  it  is  now  proposed  to  invite  attention,  will 
always  be  necessary;  and  they  will  continue  to  tax  the 
highest  wisdom  of  the  legislature.  Indeed,  no  subject 
connected  with  the  science  of  legislation  or  of  public 
economy  possesses  a  deeper  interest  than  this.  After 
due  preventive  enactments,  no  other  has  a  more 
momentous  bearing  upon  the  welfare  and  progress  of 
society.  No  other  demands  profounder  consideration 
or  more  patient  inquiry,  as  a  condition  of  wise  and 
beneficent  legislation.  Beneficent  legislation,  we  say 
advisedly  and  purposely;  for  humanity  and  charity  are 
concerned  in  it  as  well  as  policy  and  wisdom ;  or,  rather, 
in  this  case,  they  are  both  policy  and  wisdom. 

Not  that  the  inspection  and  examination,  which  this 
board  has  made,  of  the  penal  and  reformatory  institu 
tions  of  the  Commonwealth,  even  from  the  special  point 
of  view  suggested  by  its  very  title,  have  tainted  the 
minds  of  its  members  with  any  mawkish  sentimental- 
ism  over  "the  poor,  suffering"  criminal,  or  inspired 
them  with  any  frenzy  of  philanthropy,  or  with  any 
sympathy  for  the  imprisoned  convict  as  a  mere  " victim 
of  misfortune."  Far  from  it.  We  look  upon  crime 
with  horror  and  detestation,  and  we  regard  the  crimi 
nal  as  richly  deserving  punishment; — often  severe, 
grievous  punishment, — punishment  sometimes  greater 
than  man  can  inflict.  But  all  this  does  not  hinder  that 
he  should  be  an  object  of  humane,  kindly,  and  be 
neficent  regard.  In  wrath,  mercy  may  be  remem 
bered  by  man  as  well  as  by  his  Maker;  by  the  state  as 
well  as  by  the  individual.  The  criminal  is  still  a  man. 
He  is  a  criminal  and  must  be  punished,  ought  to  be 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  107 

punished;  he  is  a  man  and  must  be  treated,  must  be 
punished,  as  a  man. 

This  board  does  not  forget  that  it  is  the  creature,  the 
agent,  the  representative  of  the  legislature;  and  that  it 
has  no  proper  functions  or  aims  which  lie  beyond  and 
outside  of  the  functions  and  aims  of  the  legislature. 
Its  business  is  to  represent  the  true  character  and  spirit 
of  the  legislature,  and  no  more.  But  it  rejoices  to 
remember  that  it  has  been  constituted  and  designated 
to  represent  that  character  and  spirit  in  their  most 
generous,  their  humane,  and  benevolent  aspect.  Such 
an  aspect  it  is  firmly  believed  they  have  and,  of  right, 
ought  to  have.  That  such  an  aspect  of  character  and 
spirit  is  not  alien  to  its  functions  the  legislature  has 
formally  acknowledged  and  declared  in  the  very  act  of 
creating  the  board  itself.  Let  it  not  be  supposed  that 
it  is  intended  to  push  the  inference  too  far.  This 
board  fully  recognizes  the  fact  that  the  state  is  not  a 
mere  benevolent  association,  or  the  legislature  a  phi 
lanthropic  club;  that  the  state  looks  with  a  calm,  large 
view  at  general  results  and  the  common  weal,  rather 
than  with  a  sentimental  absorption  at  the  relief  of  par 
ticular  cases  of  hardship  and  suffering;  looks  at  politi 
cal  interests  rather  than  at  moral  and  religious  ends; 
that  the  public  good  is  the  fundamental  condition  and 
aim  of  all  legislation;  and,  particularly,  that  punish 
ments  are  inflicted  upon  criminals  in  order  to  prevent 
the  further  commission  of  crime  by  others  as  well  as  by 
themselves.  But  these  general  doctrines  are  some 
times  misunderstood  and  misapplied ;  are  overstretched 
on  their  exclusive  or  negative  side,  and  in  their  anti 
thesis  to  views  supposed  to  be  conflicting;  or  are 


108  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

urged  in  a  manner  quite  too  bold  and  peremptory.  It 
may  not  be  irrelevant,  therefore,  in  introdueing  the 
general  subject  which  has  been  proposed,  to  premise  a 
brief  preliminary  consideration  of  what  is  meant  by  the 
general  good  as  a  principle  of  legislation. 

What  does  this  principle  involve,  and  what  does  it 
exclude,  as  considerations  proper  or  improper  to  be 
taken  account  of  in  making  laws  ? 

Here  the  broad  statement  may  be  ventured,  that  a 
regard  for  popular  intelligence  and  virtue,  that  senti 
ments  of  justice  and  honor,  of  humanity  and  charity, 
are  proper  motives  for  legislators,  and  their  promotion 
and  prevalence  in  the  community  proper  objects  of 
legislation,  as  well  as  the  protection  or  advancement 
of  the  common  physical  well-being,  or  the  increase  of 
the  pecuniary  wealth  or  resources  of  the  state;  they 
are  included  under  the  idea  of  promoting  the  general 
welfare. 

In  regard  to  intelligence  and  virtue,  most  Christian 
states  have,  in  their  legislation,  practically  acknowledged 
the  truth  of  the  statement.  Our  own  State  in  partic 
ular  has  emphatically  acknowledged  it  in  providing  the 
elements  of  instruction  for  all,  and  in  encouraging  and 
fostering  the  higher  institutions  of  science  and  learn 
ing,  as  well  as  those  for  the  moral  and  religious  train 
ing  of  the  community. 

The  claims  of  justice,  too,  are  generally  admitted  in 
practice.  It  is  admitted  that  the  state  may  not  commit 
injustice  herself, — however  much  it  might  seem  to  pro 
mote  the  public  good, — and  that  it  is  a  principal  part 
of  her  office  to  administer  justice  between  man  and 
man,  to  redress  wrongs  and  to  prevent  injuries.  This 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  109 

is  admitted  to  be  involved  in  the  idea  of  promoting  the 
general -welfare;  and,  if  so,  surely  a  nice  sense  of  honor 
and  keen  sentiments  of  justice  cannot  be  unfitting  mo 
tives  to  sway  the  mind  of  a  legislator ;  or,  to  secure 
their  prevalence  in  the  community,  an  improper  object 
of  legislation. 

Thus  far  there  is  no  considerable  dispute.  The 
great  conflict  occurs  at  another  point.  It  seems  to  be 
very  generally  thought  and  assumed  that  at  all  events 
the  sentiments  of  humanity  and  charity  have  nothing 
to  do  with  statesmanship  and  legislation  ;  that  here  the 
legislator  is  bound  to  look  directly,  strictly,  and  exclu 
sively  at  the  public  interest.  But  if  the  helpless  poor, 
the  deaf,  the  blind,  the  idiotic,  the  decrepit,  were  left  to 
perish,  and  if  the  insane  were  forthwith  put  to  death, 
society  might  be  relieved  of  a  great  burden,  and  its 
physical  well-being  greatly  improved.  Only  humanity 
and  charity  forbid.  And  all  civilized  and  Christian 
states  have  in  their  legislation  recognized  the  authority 
of  these  sentiments;  have  recognized  their  exercise 
and  prevalence  in  these  relations  as  being  of  more  im 
portance  to  the  general  welfare  than  mere  dollars  and 
cents.  How  is  it  possible,  then,  that  those  who  act  for 
the  state  in  making  its  laws  should  find  it  unfitting  to 
be  themselves  influenced  by  the  same  sentiments  and 
motives  in  framing  their  enactments  ? 

In  like  manner,  in  the  treatment  of  criminals,  it  is 
believed  and  maintained  that  regard  should  be  had  to 
the  claims  of  humanity,  to  the  good  and  reformation 
of  the  offender,  as  well  as  to  the  claims  of  justice  or  to 
the  security  of  the  state,  in  the  removal  of  burdens  or 
the  deterring  of  men  from  the  commission  of  crime. 


l  I O  PRISON  E  CONOMY. 

Otherwise,  all  criminals  of  whatever  age,  under  what 
ever  circumstances,  guilty  of  crimes  of  whatever  de 
gree,  might  upon  conviction  be  straightway  put  to 
death.  If  the  legislator  is  to  look  simply  with  a  cold 
blooded  regard  to  the  public  interest,  why  should  they 
not  be?  If  it  should  be  thought  that  public  justice,  or 
the  public  good,  in  any  point  of  view,  forbid  it,  because 
they  require  a  gradation  of  punishments  according  to 
the  enormity  of  offenses,  that  requisition  might  be  met 
by  marking  the  greater  crime  with  the  more  excruci 
ating  mode  of  execution,  or  by  the  infliction  of  various 
degrees  of  preliminary  torture.  Thus  society  would 
be  summarily  relieved  of  an  oppressive  burden  of  ex 
pense,  and  men  would  most  effectually  be  deterred 
from  the  commission  of  crime,  so  far  as  severity  of 
punishment  could  deter  them.  But  not  the  spirit  of 
Christianity  alone,  the  voice  of  humanity  and  the 
genius  of  civilization,  cry  out  against  the  Draconian 
code.  Such  a  society,  a  society  with  such  a  code,  a 
society  thus  discarding  all  the  sentiments  of  humanity, 
would  be  a  society  of  savages.  And  shall  the  customs 
of  savages  furnish  the  purest  illustration  of  the  high 
est  ideal  of  human  legislation,  of  a  wise  and  single- 
minded  aim  at  fat  public  good? 

It  may  perhaps  be  suggested  that  in  a  civilized  com 
munity  such  a  code  would,  in  fact,  encourage  instead 
of  preventing  crime,  and  thus  defeat  its  own  object  and 
operate  against  the  general  good ;  because,  with  such 
a  code,  judges  and  juries  would  not  convict  or  sentence 
men  guilty  of  crimes,  especially  in  the  case  of  minor 
offenses,  and  thus  the  great  mass  of  evil-doers  would 
actually  escape  punishment  altogether.  If  this  sug- 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  1 1 1 

gestion  is  made,  it  is  cheerfully  and  frankly  admitted  ; 
but,  in  the  same  breath,  the  whole  point  here  con 
tended  for  is  admitted  also  ;  for  it  is  thus  admitted  that 
legislators,  in  their  penal  enactments,  cannot  safely 
ignore  the  sentiments  of  humanity  and  charity ;  they 
cannot  safely  so  look  at  the  public  good  as  to  leave 
these  sentiments  altogether  out  of  account  as  motives 
in  shaping  their  action. 

Nor  can  the  force  of  this  argument  be  parried  by 
saying  that  these  sentiments  must,  indeed,  be  recog 
nized  by  legislators  as  existing  facts  in  the  community, 
but  not  as  proper  motives  in  their  own  minds  ;  that, 
rather,  they  are  to  be  regarded  as  unfortunate  external 
impediments  which  they  are  compelled  to  take  account 
of,  while  they  seek,  as  directly  as  possible,  and  in  spite 
of  these  hindrances,  to  reach  their  proper  end — the 
general  interest  of  the  state.  This  implies  that,  from 
a  legislative  point  of  view,  it  would  be  desirable  that 
all  such  sentiments  should  be  abolished  in  the  com 
munity,  and  thus  a  great  impediment  removed  from 
the  direct  path  to  the  accomplishment  of  the  proper 
purpose  of  legislation, — in  short,  that  the  savage  is 
superior  to  the  civilized  state.  But  this  is  too  absurd 
to  be  openly  maintained  for  a  moment.  No  Rousseau 
can  longer  be  found  ingenious  and  hardy  enough  to 
defend  the  thesis.  Rather,  it  is  unquestionably  in  the 
highest  degree  desirable,  that  sentiments  of  humanity 
and  charity  should  pervade  the  community;  their  preva 
lence  is  a  most  important  condition  and  element  of 
the  general  welfare.  If  it  is  the  duty  of  legislators  not 
to  be  influenced  by  these  sentiments,  it  is  equally  the 
duty  of  judges  and  juries  not  to  be  influenced  by 


1 1  2  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

them  ;  and  still  more  emphatically  is  it  their  duty,  if  it 
is  made  and  declared  such  by  positive  law.  Are  the 
oaths  of  judges  and  jurymen  less  binding  than  those 
of  legislators  ?  And  if  not,  why  is  it  to  be  assumed 
that  the  former  are  more  likely  to  disregard  the  solem 
nity  of  their  oaths  than  the  latter  ?  Are  legislators  the 
only  honest  and  trustworthy  part  of  the  community  ? 
But  why  are  legislators  called  upon  to  abdicate  their 
humanity,  while  judges  and  jurymen  are  allowed  to 
retain  it?  If  this  "humanity"  is  a  weakness  and  a 
vice,  both  in  the  makers  and  the  administrators  of 
public  law,  would  not  consistency  require  that,  while 
seeking  to  abolish  it  in  one  department,  we  should  aim 
at  its  abolition  in  all  other  departments,  instead  of  yield 
ing  to  it  in  any  ?  The  fact  is,  this  ignoring  of  humanity 
by  statesmen  is,  after  all,  a  lesson  not  so  easily  learned 
or  practiced.  Men  cannot  easily  make  themselves 
mere  abstractions  or  mere  legislative  machines  :  they 
will  still  be  men.  And  if  men  are  to  govern  men,  the 
governors  must  not  only  retain  their  own  humanity, 
but  must  also  recognize  the  manhood  of  those  whom 
they  govern. 

Nor  does  the  principle  here  contended  for  rest  on 
merely  theoretic  grounds;  it  is  no  matter  of  mere  specu 
lative  sentimentalism  ;  it  has  been  practically  confirmed 
by  actual  legislation.  The  claims  not  only  of  justice, 
but  of  civilization  and  humanity  have  been  distinctly 
recognized  by  the  modern  state — in  the  abolition  of  all 
forms  of  torture  and  of  ignominious  inflictions  for 
crimes;  in  arranging  a  due  gradation  of  punishment;  in 
consulting  for  the  comfort  and  health  of  prisoners,  by 
providing  for  them  warmth,  ventilation,  and  wholesome 


PRISON  E  CO  NO  MY.  1 1 3 

diet,  and  in  establishing  reformatory  institutions  for 
juvenile  offenders,  as  well  as  in  providing  or  aiding 
from  the  common  treasury  hospitals  and  asylums  for 
the  poor,  for  the  blind,  for  deaf  mutes,  for  the  aged, 
the  feeble-minded,  the  insane,  and  the  inebriate.  As  a 
matter  of  fact,  and  to  a  large  extent,  the  Christian  state 
has  adopted,  in  her  legislation,  the  principle  of  hu 
manity  and  charity,  instead  of  unadulterated  social 
selfishness. 

The  simple  question  now  is,  will  the  state  Repudiate 
her  own  practical  principles  out  of  deference  to  an  ex 
treme,  purely  speculative,  and  savage  doctrine  of  the 
"  public  good ;"  or,  retaining  them,  will  she  carry  them 
out  in  a  thorough  and  consistent  manner  ? 

In  the  progress  of  Roman  civilization,  it  came  to  be 
felt  that  a  Roman  citizen,  however  criminal,  was  a  per 
son  too  sacred  for  scourging  or  crucifixion  ;  these  were 
punishments  reserved  for  slaves.  In  modern  civiliza 
tion,  till  quite  too  late,  have  lingered  the  pillory  and 
the  rack  and  bloody  whipping-posts,  the  mutilations  of 
noses  and  eyes  and  ears  and  hands,  the  slow  pressing 
to  death  of  recusants  and  the  cutting  out  of  the  hearts 
of  traitors,  while  the  ingenuities  of  inquisitorial  torture 
and  burning  at  the  stake  have  been  reserved  for  the 
holiday  amusement  of  religious  bigotry.  That  bigotry, 
alas,  is  not  quite  extinct,  but  in  general  it  has  learned 
to  be  content  with  less  horrible  modes  of  gratifica 
tion.  Some  remnants  and  relics  of  those  other  cruel 
and  ignominious  inflictions  still  disgrace  the  statute- 
books  and  judicial  usages  of  some  Christian  states ; 
but  even  when  they  were  in  full  operation,  under  the 
brutal  codes  of  feudal  institutions,  they  were  usually 


114  PR J SON  ECONOMY. 

accompanied  with  what  was  at  once  an  insult  to  hu 
manity  and  an  acknowledgment  of  its  claims,  in  the 
shape  of  an  exemption  from  them  in  favor  of  the  mem 
bers  of  the  governing  aristocracy.  Modern  civilization 
has,  for  the  most  .part,  entirely  outlived  them.  With 
us,  especially,  they  are  quite  obsolete.  We  have  no 
slaves,  on  the  one  hand,  and  no  aristocratic  exemp 
tions  on  the  other.  Every  American  citizen  is,  as 
such,  a  person  as  sacred  and  respectable  as  the  Roman 
citizen  of  ante-Christian,  or  the  feudal  baron  of  mediae 
val,  times  ;  and  American  laws  will  not  discriminate 
against  the  persons  of  those  who  come  to  us  as  guests 
or  as  prospective  citizens.  In  short,  it  has  been  found 
that  contempt  and  contumelious  treatment  of  our  fel 
low-men  is  not  good,  either  for  them  or  for  us;  that  the 
spirit  of  wanton  and  vindictive  cruelty  cannot  promote 
the  general  good  and  happiness  of  society,  and,  least 
of  all,  when  organized,  sanctioned,  and  executed  by  the 
authority  of  the  state,  as  an  act  of  the  whole  body 
politic ;  that  the  state  cannot  afford,  by  the  ignomini 
ous  degradation  of  humanity,  even  in  the  person  of 
the  grossest  criminal,  or  by  the  infliction  of  any  pun 
ishment  whatever  for  the  mere  purpose  of  inflicting 
pain  or  suffering  on  the  offender,  to  encourage  or 
sanction  the  spirit  of  inhumanity  or  cruelty  in  the 
community.  A  sacred  regard  for  human  kind,  or 
respect  for  the  dignity  of  man  as  man,  a  prevalent 
spirit  of  forbearance  and  kindness,  and  a  prevailing 
horror  of  cruelty,  are  better  safeguards  of  personal 
rights  and  the  public  good  than  all  the  tortures  and 
scourgings  and  pillories  and  bloody  mutilations  that 
ever  were  invented. 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  1 1  5 

Men  will  often,  if  not  always,  best  promote  their  pri 
vate  interest,  not  by  a  course  of  pure  selfishness,  not 
by  making  that  interest  the  direct  and  exclusive  end  of 
all  their  plans  and  conduct,  but  by  cherishing  and  act 
ing  upon  the  sentiments  of  justice,  humanity,  and 
charity.  If  a  farmer,  a  merchant,  or  a  manufacturer, 
having  a  number  of  men  in  his  employ,  would  have 
them  serve  him  most  heartily,  faithfully,  and  efficiently, 
he  must  show  that  he  takes  a  cordial  interest  in  them 
and  in  their  welfare  ;  they  must  be  made  to  believe 
that  he  has  such  an  interest ;  and  the  best,  the  only 
honest,  if  not  the  only  possible  way  to  make  them  be 
lieve  it,  is,  actually  to  have  it  and  cultivate  it.  In  like 
manner  individuals,  if  not  legislators,  will  often  best 
promote  the  public  good,  not  by  seeking  it  as  the  di 
rect  and  absolute  end,  but  by  consciously  aiming  at  the 
ends  of  justice  and  charity,  of  humanity  and  civiliza 
tion,  of  morality  and  religion.  And  even  legislators 
will  wisely  aim  at  these  ends  so  far  as  the  public  good 
requires,  and  seek  the  public  good  only  in  such  ways  as 
these  higher  ends  permit.  The  public  good  is  too  closely 
interwoven  with  those  ends  to  be  separated  from  them, 
either  in  fact  or  in  purpose,  even  by  the  most  abstract 
and  imperturbable  legislative  coolness. 

For  example,  whatever  a  crude  idea  of  the  public 
good  might  seem  to  require  or  sanction  to  the  con 
trary,  the  sentiments  and  the  ends  of  humanity  and 
equity  evidently  require  a  gradation  of  penalties  accord 
ing  to  the  enormity  of  offenses.  In  the  end,  the  public 
good  requires  it  too,  and  so,  as  already  said,  all  civilized 
legislation  has  practically  recognized  the  principle. 
For  if  the  theft  of  a  dime  were  visited  with  the 


1 1 6  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

same  punishment  as  the  commission  of  murder — even 
though  that  punishment  were  death — the  petty  theft 
might  indeed  come  to  be  regarded  with  greater  horror, 
but  the  crime  of  murder  would  certainly  be  most 
perilously  cheapened.  For  this  the  highest  punish 
ment  should  be  reserved  ;  on  this  the  extreme  penalty 
should  be  inflicted,  and  the  infliction  of  the  extreme 
penalty  in  this  case  is  demanded  quite  as  much  by  the 
natural  sentiments  of  humanity  as  by  any  regard  to  the 
public  welfare.  Yet  even  this  extreme  penalty  should 
be  executed,  not  with  any  adjuncts  of  needless  ignominy 
or  cruelty,  not  in  malignity  or  vindictiveness,  but  in  as 
mild  a  form  as  possible,  and  with  every  token  of  re 
luctance,  of  sympathy  and  humane  regard.  If  the 
pricipal  end  of  all  punishment  should  be  the  preven 
tion  of  crime  and  the  restraint  of  criminals,  capital 
punishment  should  remain  to  deter  men  by  the  highest 
penalty  from  the  greatest  of  crimes,  and  to  restrain  the 
criminal  absolutely,  i.  e.,  to  remove  him,  once  for  all, 
beyond  the  possibility  of  repeating  his  offense.  While, 
then,  the  sentiments  of  humanity  and  charity  undoubt 
edly  require  that  the  infliction  of  capital  punishment 
should  be  reduced  to  a  minimum,  the  same  sentiments 
of  humanity  and  charity,  with  a  due  regard  to  the 
demands  of  justice  and  the  welfare  of  society,  require 
that  it  should  be  retained  at  the  apex  of  any  system 
of  penal  jurisprudence.  But  it  is  no  part  of  our  pres 
ent  purpose  to  discuss  the  right  or  the  expediency  of 
capital  punishment.  We  only  desire  to  disavow  any 
advocacy  of  its  abolition,  and  to  protest  that  a  consist 
ent  regard  to  the  claims  of  humanity  and  charity,  which 
we  do  advocate,  does  not  require  its  abolition,  but  just 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  I 1  7 

the  contrary.  The  fact  that  the  reformation  of  the 
offender  ceases  to  be  an  object  of  this  extreme  punish 
ment,  does  not  at  all  hinder  that  it  should  be  a  proper 
and  most  important  end  to  be  sought  in  all  those  cases 
and  modes  of  punishment  in  which  there  are  room  and 
opportunity  for  seeking  it.  A  due  regard  for  the 
public  good  will  itself  make  the  distinction  in  these 
cases.  The  public  good  may  not  require  the  reforma 
tion  of  the  criminal  who  is  once  for  all  put  out  of  the 
world,  and  yet  it  may  imperatively  require  that  refor 
mation  in  the  case  of  those  who,  after  thein  term  of 
punishment  is  fulfilled,  are  to  be  restored  to  the  bosom 
of  society. 

Take  another  example  on  the  other  side.  Laws  en 
forcing  by  penalties  the  duties  of  inward  and  private 
morality,  or  the  profession  and  practice  of  true  religion, 
are  not  to  be  enacted  by  the  state,  because,  on  the 
whole,  they  would  subvert  instead  of  promoting  the 
highest  good  ;  and  that,  although  the  prevalence  of  the 
strictest  personal  morality  and  conscientiousness,  and 
the  profession  and  practice  of  the  true  religion,  must  be 
in  the  highest  degree  beneficial  to  the  whole  commu 
nity,  and  the  prevalence  of  their  opposites  the  greatest 
of  public  calamities.  So,  too,  with  sumptuary  laws  ; 
although  the  prevalence  of  temperance,  frugality,  and 
economy  cannot  fail  to  be  most  desirable  and  salutary, 
yet  the  state  cannot  undertake  to  enforce  them  by  le 
gal  penalties  without  occasioning  more  harm  than 
good.  Thus  the  ends  of  the  public  good  on  one  hand, 
and  the  ends  of  humanity,  charity,  morality,  and  justice 
on  the  other,  are  co-ordinate  motives  for  the  states 
man,  and  neither  can  be  safely  followed  to  the  entire 


I  1 8  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

disregard  of  the  others.  Such  a  following  of  the  public 
good  would  often  fail  to  reach  it ;  and  in  legislation 
such  a  pursuit  of  the  ends  of  humanity  or  morality 
would  often  be  the  surest  way  of  missing  them.  By  the 
wise  statesman  the  two  must  be  combined  in  one  view. 

As  the  board  are  about  to  suggest  certain  changes 
and  reforms  in  the  prison  economy  of  the  Common 
wealth,  they  have  ventured  upon  these  preliminary 
statements  in  order  to  "  define  their  position,"  to  place 
in  front  the  principles  upon  which  they  proceed,  and  to 
forestall  the  too-prevalent  objection  that  all  such 
schemes  of  prison  reform  are  the  mere  dreams  of  a 
very  respectable  but  unstatesmanlike  philanthropy,  of 
an  amiable  but  ignorant  and  unpractical  sentimental- 
ism  ;  having  no  basis  in  the  public  weal,  and  undeserv 
ing  the  attention  of  enlightened  legislators.  These 
preliminary  statements  have  been  entered  upon,  not  to 
instruct  the  legislature,  but  to  explain  ourselves.  We 
shall  ask  for  no  reform  which  cannot  be  shown  to  be 
demanded  by  the  public  good,  taken  in  any  large  and 
statesmanlike  sense ;  but  we  shall  not  hesitate  to  urge 
in  support  of  reforms  so  demanded  all  the  motives 
of  justice  and  morality,  of  humanity  and  civilization. 

We  may  as  well  make  up  our  minds  that  great  re 
forms  will  be  made  in  this  department  of  our  legisla 
tion  and  public  policy.  The  movements  in  this  direc 
tion,  which  have  been  going  on  in  the  civilized  world 
during  the  last  twenty  years  or  more,  and  which  have 
been  annually  increasing  in  vigor  and  volume,  show 
beyond  mistake  that  such  must  eventually  be  the  re 
sult.  In  former  times  Pennsylvania  took  the  lead  in 
prison  reforms  and  improvements;  and  much  real 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  119 

progress  was  made.  Since  then  she  has  been  too 
much  disposed  to  rest  upon  her  early  laurels,  while 
vastly  more  yet  remains  to  be  done.  The  question  is, 
will  she,  in  the  further  progress  of  this  great  work,  fol 
low  up  in  the  rear  or  take  the  lead  ?  Will  she  allow 
Russia  and  Turkey  to  get  the  start  of  her,  or  will  she 
again  give  her  lessons  of  example  to  all  western  as 
well  as  eastern  Europe  ? 

I.    THE    REFORMATORY    USE    OF    IMPRISONMENT. 

That  the  protection  of  society  or  the  prevention  of 
crime,  in  a  large  sense,  is  the  whole  object  of  imprison 
ment,  is  freely  admitted.  That  it  should  aim  at  the 
exemplary  punishment  of  crime,  and  the  restraint  of 
the  criminal  as  well  as  his  reformation,  though  by  some 
extreme  philanthropists  it  may  be  denied,  yet  is  here 
assumed  to  be  so  generally  admitted  that  it  is  not  felt 
necessary  to  attempt  any  formal  argument  in  its  proof. 
It  is  deemed  more  to  the  purpose,  in  the  present  state 
of  jurisprudence  and  of  prison  economy,  as  well  as  of 
public  opinion,  to  emphasize  the  other  side  of  the  posi 
tive  statement,  and  to  claim  for  the  reformation  of  the 
criminal  its  rightful,  but  much  forgotten  and  neglected, 
and  often  contested,  place  among  the  proper  pur 
poses  of  penal  restraint.  It  is  claimed  on  four  distinct 
grounds : — First, 

Of  Humanity. — Even  the  criminal,  as  already  said, 
has  not  ceased  to  be  a  man  ;  and  those  must  be  ex 
treme  cases  in  which  we  have  a  right  to  assume  that 
any  man  is  so  degenerate  and  utterly  corrupt  that  no 
efforts  for  his  amendment  can  be  of  any  avail.  Even 


120  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

in  the  worst  and  most  abandoned  of  men,  there  almost 
always  remain  some  relics,  some  feeble  echoes,  at  least, 
of  right  feeling ;  some  susceptibility  to  good  on  one 
side  or  another;  some  avenue  to  some  buried  and 
dormant  sparks  of  ingenuous  and  manly  emotion;  of 
right  and  virtuous  affection.  Shall  all  these  be  neg 
lected  ?  and  shall  the  poor  wretch,  by  the  solemn  legal 
action  and  systematic  arrangements  of  a  civilized  and 
Christian  community,  be  heartlessly  cast  out,  consigned, 
unaided  and  unfriended,  like  a  wild  beast,  to  the  unal- 
leviated  and  unsoftened  influence  of  mere  penal  in 
fliction — infliction  which,  as  he  is  not  a  beast  but  a 
man,  with  human  sensibilities  and  resentments,  must 
ordinarily  tend  to  harden  him  more  and  more  in  the 
recklessness  and  desperation  of  inveterate  crime  ? 
Every  generous  and  honorable  and  kindly  feeling  of 
human  nature  cries  out  against  it ;  against  mere  vin 
dictive  punishment ;  against  cool  and  unmitigated 
cruelty ;  against  the  infliction  of  one  particle  of  pain 
beyond  what  is  necessary  for  the  protection  and  well- 
being  of  society ;  and  demands,  that  if  the  reformation 
and  restoration  of  the  offender  be  by  any  reasonable 
methods  possible,  such  methods  should  be  sought  out 
and  applied. 

It  is  claimed,  secondly,  on  the  ground  of 
Simple  Right  and  Justice. — Society,  in  electing  the 
penalty  of  a  term  of  imprisonment  instead  of  capital 
punishment,  has  acknowledged  that,  in  her  judgment, 
the  offender  is  not  a  person  of  such  a  desperate  char 
acter  that  her  safety  requires  him  to  be  summarily  and 
once  for  all  put  out  of  the  way ;  she  has  acknowledged 
that  he  may  not  be  incorrigible.  As  imprisonment, 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  I  2 1 

personal  restraint,  and  detention  are  a  necessary  prac 
tical  condition  of  any  reformatory  measures  or  disci 
pline,  so  such  measures  are  a  necessary  logical  result 
or  concomitant  of  imprisonment.  In  depriving  the 
man  of  his  own  free  choice  and  self-guidance,  and 
taking  his  control  into  her  own  hands,  society  has  as 
sumed  an  unavoidable  responsibility  for  his  future 
moral  course  and  character.  He  has  become  her 
ward,  and  she  owes  him  a  duty  analagous  to  that  which 
the  parent  owes  to  the  children  whom  he  retains  under 
his  government.  While  she  chooses  to  maintain  this  re 
lation  to  him,  she  has  no  right  to  neglect  any  means  in 
her  power  for  his  reformation  and  moral  improvement, 
and,  in  general,  for  his  preparation  to  discharge  his 
duties  as  an  industrious  and  virtuous  member  of  so 
ciety,  when  he  shall  be  restored  to  its  bosom  and  placed 
again  under  his  own  control.  This  simple  justice  re 
quires,  and  whatever  it  may  cost  to  meet  it,  the  state 
cannot  rid  itself  of  this  responsibility.  But,  in  fact,  to 
meet  it  manfully  will  be  found  to  save  the  public  more 
than  it  costs. 

It  is  claimed,  then,  in  the  third  place,  as  demanded 
by  the  public  good,  and  this  in  a  threefold  way  :— 

i.  As  a  most  effective  example  deterrent  to  vice 
and  encouraging  to  virtue.  The  spectacle  of  penal 
inflictions,  severe  and  persistent,  yet  adapted  to  and 
resulting  in  the  reformation  of  the  criminal,  must  have 
an  unspeakably  greater  power  to  deter  men  from  crime 
than  the  mere  infliction  of  mere  punishment,  though 
tenfold  more  rigorous,  and  however  sanguinary  and 
cruel.  It  shows,  clear  as  the  sun,  the  unutterable 


I  2  2  PRISON  E  CO  NO  MY. 

folly  of  crime  ;  it  cows  down  all  its  defiant  bravado, 
and  quells  all  its  bitter  hatred  against  society  ;  it  turns* 
by  a  flank  movement,  the  last  intrenchments  of  its 
dogged  spirit  of  martyrdom  and  its  pride  of  heroic 
endurance.  Every  reformed  criminal,  returned  to  the 
bosom  of  society,  while  he  is  thus  a  living  and  constant 
lesson  of  rebuke,  of  repression,  and  of  humiliation  to 
the  criminally  disposed,  must  be  also  a  monument  of 
encouragement  and  strength  to  the  feeble  endeavors 
of  those  who,  in  the  midst  of  temptation,  and  after 
many  failures,  would  gladly  persevere  in  the  effort  to 
raise  themselves  from  the  moral  degradation  into 
which  they  have  fallen. 

2.  Every  criminal  reformed  is  a  positive  diminution 
of  the  number  of  criminals  to  infest  society;  and  this, 
though  such  cases  should  be  but  few,  is  no  insignificant 
gain,  when  compared  with  the  process  of  returning  the 
criminal,  who  has  served  out  his  imprisonment,  hard 
ened  in  crime,  hardened  by  the  very  punishment  he 
has    sullenly   endured,   and"  rankling   with   revengeful 
malignity  against  that  society  which  inflicted  the  pun 
ishment;  returning  him  to  reinforce  and  marshal  the 
ever-swelling  army  of  malefactors  who  are  pressing  on 
in  his  footsteps. 

3.  Such  reformations,  to  the  full  extent  to  which  they 
take  place,  tend  powerfully  to  prevent  the  education  of 
others  in  crime.     That  education  comes  very  largely 
from  the  old  adepts,  both  in  prison, — where  they  are 
promiscuously  mixed  up  with  the  other  prisoners,  from 
the  youthful  novice  to  the  hoary  offender,  as  they  natur- 


PRISON  E  CON O MY.  I  2  3 

ally  will  be  when  no  account  is  made  of  the  reformation 
of  convicts, — and  out  of  prison,  after  they  have  been 
discharged  unreformed  from  their  term  of  punishment. 
Prisoners  discharged  without  reformation  have  taken 
their  doctor's  degree  as  teachers  of  crime. 

It  is  claimed,  in  the  fourth  place,  as  necessary  to 
consistency  in  our  legislation. 

The  principle  of  making  the  reformation  of  the  con 
vict  one  of  the  chief  objects  of  his  imprisonment,  has 
been  distinctly  engrafted  upon  the  legislation  of  this 
Commonwealth.  In  connection  with  county  jails  it  is 
provided  by  the  act  of  I4th  April,  1835,  that  the  matron 
should  give  the  (female)  convicts  under  her  charge 
"such  instructions  as  may  tend  to  their  reformation, 
and  to  render  them  useful  members  of  society."  And, 
in  connection  with  the  State  penitentiaries,  it  is  pro 
vided,  by  the  act  of  23d  April,  1829,  that  "it  shall  be 
the  duty  of  the  instructor  to  attend  to  the  moral  and 
religious  instruction  of  the  convicts  in  such  manner  as 
to  make  their  confinement  as  far  as  possible  the  means 
of  their  reformation,  so  that  when  restored  to  their 
liberty  they  may  prove  honest,  industrious,  and  useful 
members  of  society."  In  establishing  her  reformatories 
for  juvenile  offenders,  the  State  has  also  most  clearly 
recognized  reformation  from  crime  as  a  proper  object 
of  public  legislation.  In  thus  selecting  juvenile  offend 
ers  she  has  undoubtedly  selected  both  the  easiest  and 
the  most  important  portion  of  the  work.  But  reforma 
tion,  if  possible,  is  also  desirable  in  the  case  of  adults ; 
and,  if  not  possible,  at  what  precise  age  did  the  possi 
bility  cease?  In  the  very  name  of  "penitentiary," 
which  the  State  has  given  to  some  of  her  prisons, 


I  2  4  PRISON  E  CONOMY. 

she  presupposes  that  it  does  not  cease  with  adult 
years. 

The  reformation  of  the  criminal,  therefore,  is  solemnly 
acknowledged  by  the  State  to  be  an  important  end  of 
his  penal  restraint,  and  at  the  same  time  it  is  acknowl 
edged  that  restraint  will  not  of  itself  effect  the  purpose, 
but  that  some  other  special  provision  is  required  for  its 
accomplishment.  Now,  these  points  being  conceded, 
consistency  plainly  demands  that  the  law  should  not 
stop  until  it  has  found  some  effectual  provision  for  so 
important  an  end,  if  any  such  provision  is  possible  con 
sistently  with  the  other  ends  of  imprisonment  and  the 
requirements  of  the  public  good. 

At  all  events,  when  the  reformation  of  the  criminal 
is  urged  as  one  of  the  ends  of  penal  legislation,  let  it 
be  remembered  that  the  existing  statute  endorses  the 
demand;  and  when  such  arrangements  of  prison  disci 
pline  and  management  are  proposed  as  shall  most 
effectually  accomplish  this  end,  the  proposer  is  not  to 
be  bluffed  off  with  any  polite  allusions  to  sentimental 
philanthropy,  or  the  easy  utterance  of  any  mere  phrases 
of  disparagement.  It  is  to  be  seriously  and  candidly 
inquired  and  earnestly  considered  whether  such  pro 
posed  plans  are  feasible,  and  are  consistent  with  the 
other  ends  of  public  justice  and  with  the  public  good. 
If  so,  they  should  be  forthwith  adopted. 

II.    LABOR    OF    CONVICTS. 

We  here  take  for  granted  that  the  reformation  of 
the  convict  is  one  of  the  objects  of  his  incarceration; 
while  fully  admitting  that  punishment  is  another — for 


PRISON  E  CONOMY.  I  2  5 

incarceration  is  punishment.  It  is  accordingly  assumed 
that,  so  far  as  possible,  such  means  are  to  be  joined 
with  the  punishment  as  will  render  that  punishment 
itself  reformatory,  which  alone  would  not  be  so.  Labor 
is  believed  to  be  such  a  means;  and  it  is  now  proposed 
to  set  forth,  in  some  degree  at  least,  how  this  means 
may  be  made  most  effectual  to  that  end. 

i.  There  are,  first,  certain  important  questions  as  to 
the  proper  character  and  conditions  of  convict  labor; 
among  them  are  the  following: — 

(a.)  The  labor  itself  may  be  considered  a  part  of  the 
punishment;  but  should  it  be  purely  punitive,  or  also 
productive  ? 

It  is  believed  that  labor  of  a  merely  punitive  character 
can  have  no  reformatory  and  little  deterring  effect.  It 
sours,  irritates,  hardens.  It  seems  to  be  now  generally 
conceded  that  the  tread-mill,  as  a  form  of  labor  or  a  sub 
stitute  for  it,  is  productive  of  little  if  any  good,  but  rather 
of  much  harm  ;  and  it  is  to  the  credit  of  French  prison 
discipline  that,  though  French  history  has  had  its  Bastile, 
the  French  language  has  no  term  whereby  to  trans 
late  the  name  of  this  engine  of  punishment.  In  its 
expensive  uselessness,  it  is  a  merely  vindictive  and  de 
grading  infliction.  It  is,  moreover,  unjust  and  unequal, 
imposing  what  may  be  an  easy  exertion  for  one  and  a 
most  exhausting,  if  not  dangerous,  exertion  for  another. 
And  finally,  the  tread-mill  system  taken  instead  of  pro 
ductive  employment  is  a  manifest  and  wanton  waste  of 
what  might  just  as  well  be  utilized  as  thrown  away.  If 
employed  at  all  in  prisons,  it  should  not  be  as  a  constant 


I  2  6  PRISON  E  CONOMY. 

thing,  or  as  a  general  substitute  for  proper  work,  but  it 
should  be  reserved  for  some  special  and  extraordinary 
occasions,  as  a  punishment  for  gross  violations  of  order, 
or  for  the  health  of  the  prisoner  who  positively  declines 
to  work.  If  labor  is  to  be  made  even  a  wholesome 
punishment,  still  more  if  it  is  to  be  made  a  means  of 
reformation,  it  must  be  productive.  However  grievous, 
it  must  be  attended  with  the  apprehension  that  it  has 
some  other  object  than  merely  to  punish,  and  with  the 
encouragement  that  it  accomplishes  something.  It 
must  have  so  much  the  character  of  ordinary  labor  as 
to  tend  to  form  habits  of  mind  and  body  which  will  be 
of  service  to  the  prisoner  after  his  release. 

(6.)  Shall  the  labor  be  performed  in  cells  or  in 
common  workshops,  in  individual  separation  or  in 
groups  ? 

This  might  bring  up  the  whole  vexed  question  be 
tween  the  solitary  and  the  congregate  systems  of  peni 
tentiary  discipline,  which  it  is  not  proposed  now  to 
discuss;  nor  is  it  necessary,  for  reformatory  labor  can 
be  appropriately  combined  with  both.  But,  as  will  be 
seen  in  the  sequel,  there  are  weighty  reasons  for  the 
conclusion  that  it  cannot  completely  answer  its  best  pur 
poses  if  confined  exclusively  and  throughout  the  whole 
period  of  discipline  to  either. 

To  this  subject  we  have  already  referred  in  our 
former  reports.  In  that  of  1870  we  alluded  to  "  a 
change  in  the  Pennsylvania  system  which  has  recently 
taken  place  in  one  of  the  penitentiaries  of  the  State, 
under  the  sanction  of  law.  By  recent  legislation, 
namely,  under  date  8th  April,  1869,  the  congregate 


PRISON  E  CONOMY.  1 2  7 

system  is  allowed  in  the  Western  Penitentiary  for  the 
several  purposes  of  labor,  learning,  and  religious  in 
struction.  The  government  and  officers  are  unani 
mous  in  the  approval  of  the  system  thus  introduced." 
In  regard  to  this  partial  introduction  of  the  congregate 
system,  we  added  : — "  There  are  embarrassments  which 
oppress  every  unprejudiced  mind  in  its  reflections  upon 
this  grave  subject.  It  cannot  fail  to  discover,  with 
other  advantages,  vigorous  and  remunerative  labor, 
which  is  always  morally  healthful,  accomplished  on  the 
one  side,  and  a  discipline  exerted  under  circumstances 
accordant  with  man's  nature  and  condition  ;  and  on 
the  other  side,  it  sees  as  plainly,  baleful  exposures  of 
convicts  to  mutual  acquaintanceship  and  probably  con 
tamination — the  possibly  innocent,  the  certainly  un- 
hardened,  with  the  obdurate  and  insensate  criminal ; 
and  the  want,  also,  of  that  opportunity  of  intro-reflection 
which,  if  not  enforced,  may  never  come,  and  which  is 
a  necessary  foundation  for  a  trustworthy  reform." 

In  the  report  of  last  year,  having  pointed  out  the  ex 
treme  peril  of  "  relieving  a  man  from  solitude  after  a 
few  months  of  effort  for  his  reformation,  by  transfer 
ring  him  from  an  apartment  in  which  he  had  no  so 
ciety,  except  when  visited  by  the  benevolent  for  his 
good,  to  the  common  receptacles  for  men  convicted  of 
crime,"  we  added  : — "  Prevention  of  intercourse  be 
tween  convicted  criminals,  from  first  to  last,  we  esteem 
indispensable  to  successful  effort  for  their  reform.  Let 
them  have  stated  and,  so  far  as  may  be,  diversified  oc 
cupation  ;  let  them  have  carefully  selected  books  for 
entertainment ;  let  them  receive  visits  from  judicious 
friends  and  counselors  seeking  their  good;  but  keep 


I  2  8  PRISON  E CONOMY. 

them  away,  while  in  the  custody  of  the  State,  from  in 
tercourse  with  each  other." 

We  beg  now  to  observe  that,  in  that  connection,  we 
could  not  be  supposed  to  mean  that  no  intercourse  what 
ever  between  any  two  convicts,  however  carefully  se 
lected  at  any  period  in  their  course  of  reformation  or  for 
any  purpose  or  under  any  circumstances  whatever, 
would  be  safe  or  should  be  allowed ;  but  that  they  should 
be  kept  away  from  that  sort  of  general  or  indiscriminate 
intercourse  which  prevails  ordinarily  under  the  congre 
gate  system  ;  to  which  system,  conducted  in  any  such 
way  as  we  have  had  the  opportunity  of  observing,  we 
remain,  as  in  the  past,  thoroughly  opposed.  Besides 
which,  as  we  have  said  in  another  place,  we  must 
"take  things  as  they  are,"  and  as  they  have  been 
qualified  and  determined  by  public  sentiment  and 
legislation  founded  thereon,  if  our  views  are  to  be 
made  practically  suggestive. 

Thus,  after  the  earnest  advocacy  of  the  strictly 
"separate"  system  of  imprisonment  by  some  of  the 
best  and  most  philanthropic  minds  of  the  State,  often 
against  strenuous  opposition  ;  and  after  an  example  of 
its  practical  application  for  nearly  half  a  century  in 
what  may  be  called  model  establishments,  designed  in 
all  their  appliances  for  the  perfect  carrying  out  of  the 
system,  what  do  we  find  ?  Not  one  prison  or  peni 
tentiary  in  the  State  in  which  it  is  conducted  in  its  en 
tirety.  We  find  the  authorities  of  one  penitentiary 
repudiating  it  and  demanding  its  overthrow  there,  and 
the  legislature  acquiescing  in  their  demand ;  while,  at 
the  same  time,  it  denies  to  the  other  the  full  realization 
of  the  opposite  views — held  with  equal  tenacity  by 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  129 

high,  even  exceptional  ability,  influence,  and  experi 
ence — by  keeping  the  penitentiary  accommodations  so 
restricted  as  effectually  to  prevent,  in  many  cases,  the 
separate  confinement  of  its  prisoners. 

And  the  "  separate  system  "  is  equally  neglected  in 
the  county  establishments.  In  these,  with  the  excep 
tion  of  an  inconsiderable  number,  where  it  partially 
obtains,  there  is  no  attempt  to  follow  the  system  in  any 
one  respect.  Premising  this  we  proceed  : — 

Strictly  solitary  confinement  for  a  long  period,  with 
out  labor,  is  a  punishment  altogether  too  cruel  to  be 
imposed ;  it  is  more  than  human  nature  can  bear  ;  it 
must  undermine  and  break  down  the  health  both  of 
body  and  mind  ;  it  is  killing  by  inches,  inflicting  capital 
punishment  by  slow  degrees  ;  or  if  the  convict  survives, 
and  is  at  length  released,  he  is  let  out  upon  society 
vastly  more  unfit  and  more  unlikely  to  discharge  his 
duties  then,  and  earn  an  honest  livelihood,  than  he  was 
before  his  incarceration.  And  even  if  solitary  labor 
be  added  to  such  confinement,  continued  through  the 
entire  period  of  penitentiary  discipline,  while  all  must 
admit  that  much  of  the  cruelty,  and  many  of  the  physi 
cal  and  moral  evils  may  be  avoided,  it  maybe  seriously 
questioned  whether  the  prospect,  upon  the  convict's 
release,  will  be  most  favorable  to  the  discharge  of 
these  duties.  It  is  at  least  fair  to  inquire  : — Is  he  likely 
to  continue  such  labor  when  restored  to  liberty  and  to 
the  influence  of  free  society  ?  What  training  has  it 
furnished  him  for  meeting  the  accumulated  trials  and 
difficulties  and  temptations  that  surround  and  oppress 
him  the  moment  he  is  thrown  again  upon  society  and 
his  own  resources  ?  His  labor  has  not  been  pursued 


130  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

under    the    ordinary    circumstances,   motives,  and    in 
fluences.       His    discipline    may    have    made    him    an 
excellently  well-behaved  convict,  but  has  it  prepared 
him  to  meet  the  perils,  and  perform  the  duties,  of  a. 
free  and  industrious  member  of  society  ? 

On  the  other  hand,  if  the  congregate  system  of  labor 
is  applied  indiscriminately,  and  throughout  the  whole 
period  of  imprisonment  to  all  grades  and  classes  of  con 
victs  alike,  mixing  all  up  together  in  working  gangs, — 
young  and  old,  novices  and  adepts  in  crime ;  those 
committed  for  greater  and  those  for  lesser  offenses, 
for  longer  and  for  shorter  periods ;  those  convicted 
for  the  second  or  the  third  time,  and  those  under 
punishment  for  their  first  offense  ;  the  old  long-wonted 
inmates  of  the  prison  and  the  new-comers, — it  will 
scarcely  be  possible,  by  any  methods  or  contrivances 
for  enforcing  silence  and  shutting  off  communication, 
to  prevent  such  companies  from  becoming  schools  of 
increasing  corruption  and  wickedness,  instead  of  amend 
ment  and  reformation.  The  only  preventive  must  be 
a  free  and  familiar  use  of  the  lash;  a  mode  of  punish 
ment  so  inhuman  and  degrading  that  it  is  scarcely 
allowed  by  enlightened  and  civilized  jurisprudence  to 
be  inflicted  for  any  crime,  even  upon  the  sentence  of 
any  magistrate  or  judge,  high  or  low ;  a  punishment, 
therefore,  one  would  suppose  still  less  to  be  left  to  the 
daily  discretion  of  mere  prison-keepers  or  underling 
overseers.  And  if  all  objections  were  removed,  labor 
under  such  circumstances  is,  as  we  shall  endeavor 
further  on  to  show  more  fully,  little  fitted  to  train  men 
to  earn  their  subsequent  livelihood  in  habits  of  free 
and  virtuous  industry. 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  131 

In  order  to  approximate  the  desired  reformatory 
result,  would  it  not  be  better  that  the  two  systems — the 
separate  and  the  congregate — should  be  combined, 
each  at  its  proper  season,  in  its  proper  degree,  and  with 
a  due  regard  to  the  natural  disposition  and  habits,  the 
temper  and  character,  of  the  different  prisoners  ?  It  is 
believed  they  may  be  so  combined  most  effectually 
and  advantageously.  Indeed,  the  latter  system,  under 
any  tolerable  existing  arrangement,  is  so  far  combined 
with  the  former  as  to  provide  for  the  distribution  of 
the  prisoners  into  separate  cells  by  night.  How  the 
two  systems  may  be  best  combined  in  connection  with 
the  different  periods  of  the  term  of  imprisonment  and 
the  different  classes  and  characters  of  the  prisoners,  it 
is  proposed  to  develop  under  another  head. 

The  importance  of  labor  as  an  element  of  corrective 
discipline,  as  well  as  the  importance  of  combining  the 
two  systems  of  labor,  is  thus  set  forth  by  one  of  the 
earliest  and  most  earnest  advocates  of  the  separate 
system,  Mr.  Edward  Livingston  :— 

"Of  all  the  crimes  in  the  catalogue  of  human  de 
pravity,  four-fifths  are,  in  different  forms,  invasions  of 
private  property ;  and  the  motive  for  committing  them 
is  the  desire  of  obtaining,  without  labor,  the  enjoy 
ments  which  property  brings.  The  natural  corrective 
is  to  deprive  the  offender  of  the  gratifications  he  ex 
pects,  and  to  convince  him  that  they  can  be  acquired 
by  the  exertion  of  industry.  The  remaining  propor 
tion  of  offenses  are  such  as  arise  from  the  indulgence 
of  the  bad  passions,  and  for  those  also  solitude  and 
employment  are  the  best  correctives.  But  whatever 
corrects  the  desire  or  the  passion  that  prompts  the 


V 


132  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

offense,  acts  in  the  double  capacity,  first  of  punishment, 
and,  afterwards,  when  it  is  effected,  of  reformation. 
*  The  prisoner  who  labors  lessens  the 
expense  of  his  support ;  he  who  works  skillfully  and 
diligently  may  more  than  repay  it.  The  advantage  of 
this  beneficial  result  must  be  felt  by  the  prisoner  as  well 
as  by  the  state  ;  if  the  proceeds  of  his  work  should  not 
be  sufficient  to  cover  his  expenses,  it  yet  produces  for 
him  a  better  diet ;  and  if  preserved  in  and  accom 
panied  with  good  conduct,  for  certain  probationary 
periods  of  six  and  twelve  months,  during  which  he  is 
permitted,  in  the  day,  to  leave  his  cell  and  pursue  his 
solitary  employment  in  the  court,  he  is  indulged  with 
the  privilege  of  working  and  receiving  instruction  in  a 
small  class,  not  exceeding  ten."* 

(c.)  Another  question  is,  should  convict  labor  be 
purposely  made  servile  and  degrading,  or  as  cheerful 
and  elevating  as  possible  ? 

To  answer  this  question,  we  have  only  to  propose 
and  answer  to  ourselves  another  question  :  is  it  our 
purpose,  by  the  temporary  incarceration  of  criminals 
to  make  them  worse,  and  then  turn  them  out  upon 
society  again ;  or  to  make  them  better  fitted  and  better 
disposed,  upon  their  return,  to  discharge  the  duties  of 
virtuous  and  industrious  citizens  ?  Our  means  must 
be  adapted  to  the  end  we  have  in  view  ;  and  we  are 
responsible  for  the  end  to  which  our  means  are  adapted. 
But  what  right  have  we  forcibly  to  seize  upon  a  bad 
man  and  make  him  worse  ?  What  right  have  we  to 

*  Livingston's  Criminal  Code,  pages  309  and  337. 


Pit  I  SON  E  CONOMY.  1 3  3 

deprive  an  erring"  fellow-mortal  of  his  own  free  choice, 
unless  we,  at  the  same  time,  use  all  the  means  in 
our  power  so  to  control  and  guide  him  as  to  reform 
his  errors  and  turn  him  into  the  paths  of  virtue  and 
rectitude  ?  The  man  is  dejected,  desponding,  distrust 
ful  of  his  power  of  self-control  or  of  virtuous  living  ; 
shall  we  discourage  him  s.till  more  ?  Shall  we  drive 
him  to  desperation  ?  He  is  degraded,  degraded  in 
fact,  degraded  in  his  own  eyes  ;  shall  we  degrade  him 
still  more  ?  He  is  reckless  and  malicious ;  shall  we 
sink  him  to  lower  depths  of  recklessness,  and  add  a 
new  fund  of  venom  to  his  malice  ?  If  not,  if  we  pro 
pose  to  raise  and  reform  him,  shall  we  make  the  very 
labor  on  which  we  rely  for  that  end  a  badge  of  degra 
dation  ?  Let  it  be  understood,  once  for  all,  that  no 
degrading  inflictions  whatever  can  restore  a  spirit  of 
manliness  to  the  corrupt  and  depraved.  Labor,  im 
posed  under  such  a  category,  is  not  likely  to  be  con 
tinued  after  release,  nor  can  it  be  regarded  by  the 
released  convict  with  complacency  or  respect.  And 
yet  that  complacency  in  labor,  that  respect  for  labor, 
are  precisely  what  it  was  above  all  things  necessary  to 
associate  with  it  in  the  convict's  mind  ;  so  that,  after 
release,  he  might  be  weaned  from  his  evil  courses  and 
disposed  to  resort,  to  the  proper  methods  of  obtaining 
an  honest  livelihood.  To  this  end  his  labor,  while  in 
detention,  should  be  made,  as  far  as  possible,  cheerful 
and  attractive,  a  constant  means  of  encouragement  and 
elevation.  That  this  need  not  be  inconsistent  with  his 
severe  and  terrible  punishment,  will,  in  the  sequel,  be 
made  sufficiently  clear. 


134  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

(d.)   Should  convict  labor  be  enforced  or  voluntary  ? 

This  question  covers  the  principle  which  controls  the 
case  ;  it  embraces  and  sums  up  most  of  the  other  in 
quiries. 

The  effort  to  get  the  benefits  without  bearing  the 
burdens  of  labor  is  the  occasion  of  most  of  the  of 
fenses  committed  against  society.  To  correct  this  dis 
position  is  the  grand  business  of  penitentiary  discipline. 
Enforced  labor  may  do  something  towards  this  end  by 
forming  certain  physical  habits,  and  imparting  or  rather 
impressing  a  certain  degree  of  training  to  orderly  rou 
tine  and  manual  dexterity ;  but  the  motives  and  asso 
ciations  under  which  this  is  done  are  such  that  there 
must  be  the  greatest  danger  that  the  best-behaved  and 
most  industrious  and  skillful  convict  will  lose  his  good 
habits,  and  disuse  or  misuse  his  skill,  as  soon  as  he  is 
committed  again  to  his  own  control. 

We  venture  to  retrace  here  somewhat  at  large  Mr. 
Livingston's  plan  of  voluntary  convict  labor. 

"  No  succession  of  involuntary  acts  to  which  adults 
may  be  coerced  is  likely  to  produce  permanent  habits 
of  reformation  ;  they  must  be  the  effect  of  the  will, 
operated  upon  by  the  judgment,  producing  a  con 
viction  that  such  acts  are  beneficial ;  and  experience 
must  enforce  this  conviction  by  giving  the  actual  en 
joyment  of  some,  and  the  certain  hope  of  other,  bene 
fits  that  are  the  result  of  these  acts.  With  evil  habits 
it  is  different ;  for  the  most  part  they  are  acquired  by 
the  repetition  of  acts  procuring  sensual  enjoyment ; 
and  the  judgment  has  so  little  agency  in  procuring 
them,  that  it  must  be  silenced  or  perverted  before  the 
acts  of  indulgence  are  done  or  repeated.  It  is  for  this 


PRISOA?  ECONOMY.  135 

reason  that  the  work  of  reformation  is  more  difficult 
than  that  of  perversion  ;  the  one  requires  intellectual 
power  sufficient  to  prefer  a  distant  and  moral  good 
to  a  present  and  physical  enjoyment ;  the  other  coin 
cides  with  the  natural  propensity  for  present  enjoy 
ment,  reckless  of  what  an  uncertain  futurity  may  pro 
duce.  And  for  this  reason,  also,  it  is  that  the  work  of 
reformation  is  slower  in  its  operation  than  that  of  cor 
ruption.  The  spring  which  sets  in 
motion  my  whole  machinery  for  producing  reform  is 
this : — That  all  the  acts  which,  by  their  succession,  are 
to  produce  habits  of  good,  are  to  be  performed  volun 
tarily,  and  are  offered  as  alleviations  of  the  severity  of 
the  sentence  ;  the  will  must  act  or  the  repetition  will 
produce  no  effect.  But,  to  operate  on  the  inclination, 
sufficient  inducements  must  be  held  out  to  overcome 
the  natural  repugnance  to  labor. 
Privation  of  employment  is  denounced  as  a  part  of 
the  punishment ;  and  this  circumstance  alone  would, 
with  most  men,  cause  it  to  be  considered  as  an  evil, 
and  the  experience  of  its  effects  will  soon  cause  it  to 
be  felt  as  such  ;  of  course  it  will  be  connected  with  the 
idea  of  suffering ;  and  occupation  being  denied,  will, 
from  the  propensity  to  wish  for  that  from  which  we  are 
expressly  debarred,  be  estimated  as  a  good,  and 
desired  with  an  intensity  proportioned  to  the  stric 
tures  and  length  of  the  privation.  To  strengthen 
this  natural  desire  .other  inducements  are  offered. 
If  the  prisoner  acquires  such  pro 
ficiency  in  the  business  as  to  make  the  proceeds  of  his 
industry  exceed  the  expense  of  his  support,  he  is  al 
lowed  the  immediate  enjoyment  of  a  part,  to  be  laid 


136  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

out  in  books  or  such  other  articles  as  he  may  desire. 
Those  of  food  or  drink  are  excepted,  in  order  to  avoid 
irregularities  that  otherwise  would  be  unavoidable  ;  and 
the  residue  of  the  surplus  is  an  accumulating  fund  to 
be  paid  to  him  on  his  discharge.  To  give  the  greater 
effect  to  these  inducements,  they  are  not  offered  to  the 
convict  on  his  commitment  to  the  prison  ;  first,  he  must 
know  and  feel  the  unmitigated  punishment ;  his  own 
reflections  must  be  his  only  companions  for  a  prelimi 
nary  period,  during  which  he  is  closely  confined  to  his 
cell ;  he  must  live  on  the  coarse  diet  allowed  to  the 
unemployed  prisoner ;  he  must  suffer  the  tedium  aris 
ing  from  want  of  society  and  occupation,  and  when  he 
begins  to  feel  that  labor  would  be  an  indulgence,  it  is 
offered  to  him  as  such  ;  it  is  not  threatened  to  him  as 
an  evil,  nor  urged  upon  his  acceptance  as  an  advantage 
to  any  but  to  himself;  and  when  he  is  employed,  no 
stripes,  no  punishment  whatever  are  inflicted  for  want 
of  diligence  ;  if  not  properly  used  the  indulgence  is 
withdrawn,  and  he  returns  to  his  solitude  and  other 
privations,  not  to  punish  him  for  not  laboring,  but 
merely  because  his  comduct  shows  that  he  prefers  that 
state  to  the  enjoyment  with  which  employment  must 
always  be  associated  in  his  mind,  in  order  to  produce 
reformation.  If  it  has  been  shown  that  involuntary 
acts  will  not  produce  a  lasting  habit,  then,  if  there  be 
any  such  as  will  not  accept  these  alleviations  of  their 
imprisonment  upon  them  the  imprisonment  must  ope 
rate  solely  as  a  punishment.  But  experience  shows 
that  these  exceptions  will,  if  any,  be  very  few,  for 
employment,  even  under  the  lash,  is  in  most  cases  pre 
ferred  to  solitude."  (Pages  336,  337.) 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  137 

To  this  we  might  propose  to  add,  as  will  be  seen,  a 
further  but  cautious  introduction  of  social  labor  (still 
voluntary),  with  increasing  degrees  of  liberty,  as  the 
process  of  reformation  goes  on,  until  the  reformed 
convict  passes  into  society  in  full  freedom,  by  an  easy 
step,  with  habits  ready  formed  for  his  new  condition, 
prepared  to  act  upon  the  same  motives  after  his  re 
lease  as  before,  and  without  any  great  shock  either  to 
society  or  to  himself. 

It  maybe  objected  that,  in  the  plan  above  described, 
the  labor  is,  after  all,  enforced  ;  that  the  remanding  to 
the  solitary  cell,  without  occupation,  is  coercion  as  much 
as  the  lash.  We  answer,  first,  that  it  involves  no  deg 
radation  ;  secondly,  it  is  self-inflicted — a  deliberately 
chosen  alternative ;  thirdly,  in  its  nature  it  leads  not  to 
passion  but  to  consideration  ;  fourthly,  when  the  labor 
comes  it  comes  not  as  a  punishment,  but  as  an  allevi 
ation  of  punishment ;  and,  fifthly,  the  labor,  if  enforced, 
is  enforced  by  the  same  sort  of  motives  by  which  it  is 
enforced  in  ordinary  life,  /.  e.,  as  a  means  of  obtaining 
certain  objects  of  desire,  of  comfort,  and  gratification. 

It  may  be  objected  that,  in  its  ultimate  working,  this 
plan  leaves  punishment  out  of  account  altogether,  and 
aims  exclusively  at  reformation.  We  answer,  no  ;  the 
proper  punishment  yet  remains  in  full  force — imprison 
ment,  solitude,  want  of  occupation  either  for  the  mind 
or  body,  coarse  aliments,  hard  lodging,  clothing  of  the  \ 
roughest  kind.  These  are  the  evils  of  which  punish 
ments  are  composed ;  their  duration,  their  intensity,  their 
cumulation,  are  the  means  of  adapting  them  to  differ 
ent  offenses,  and  are  to  be  duly  prescribed  in  each  sen 
tence  ;  their  alleviation  in  different  degrees  and  after 


138  PXISOAT  ECONOMY. 

the  prescribed  interval,  by  permitted  and  encouraged 
labor,  is  the  means  of  producing-  reform. 

It  may  be  objected  that  thus  the  deterring  power  of 
punishment  is  destroyed.  Again  we  answer,  no  ;  the 
punishment,  with  all  its  terror,  still  remains,  in  such 
degree  and  for  such  period  as  the  law  judges  neces 
sary  ;  but  the  remedial  system  is  added, — a  system 
which,  itself  also,  teaches  all  criminals  and  criminally- 
disposed  persons  that  the  only  way  to  escape  the  pun 
ishment  is  to  resort  to  that  very  labor,  the  hope  of 
avoiding  which  is  their  most  ordinary  temptation  to 
crime. 

(e.)  Is  the  reformatory  labor  to  be  performed  under 
the  immediate  oversight  and  direction  of  the  prison 
authorities,  or  by  the  intervention  and  under  the  con 
trol  of  contractors  ? 

The  answer  is,  emphatically,  the  former  and  not  the 
latter.  Nothing  has  led  to  greater  deterioration  of 
prison  discipline,  corruption  of  the  prison-keepers,  and 
demoralization  of  the  prisoners  than  this  system  of  con 
tract  labor,  wherever  it  has  been  adopted.  It  com 
pletely  annuls  the  idea  of  reformation  as  an  object  of 
prison  labor,  and  makes  it  merely  a  means  of  petty 
profit  or  pecuniary  relief  to  the  state  (in  which  it  some 
times  signally  fails),  and  of  untold  and  irresponsible 
oppressions  and  cruelties  on  the  part  of  the  interested 
and  unfeeling  overseers  and  drivers.  The  labor  should 
be  performed  under  the  eye  and  control  of  responsible 
parties,  who  have  no  selfish  ends  to  accomplish  by  it, 
and  who  will  take  a  humane  and  personal  interest  in 
the  welfare  and  amendment  of  the  convicts.  Not  the 


PRISON  ECONOMY,  139 

present  profit  of  the  labor,  but  its  bearing  upon  the 
future  good  of  the  laborer  is  the  absorbing  concern. 
The  health,  strength,  and  previous  habits  of  prisoners 
are  to  be  considered  ;  not  the  amount  of  product,  but 
faithfulness  and  diligence  are  to  be  rewarded. 

(f.)  And  here  the  general  question  may  be  raised, 
whether  the  products  of  convict  labor  should  inure 
exclusively  to  the  benefit  of  the  state,  or  also  to  the 
present  and  future  benefit  of  the  convicts. 

In  answer,  we  have  no  hesitation  in  saying  that  if  it 
is  to  accomplish  its  reformatory  function  to  any  consid 
erable  degree,  its  profits  must  be  permitted  to  inure  in 
part  and  sensibly  to  the  benefit  of  the  convict.  This 
is  an  essential  point.  The  state  should  undoubtedly 
have  the  first  and  largest  portion  of  the  proceeds,  not 
from  any  petty  economical  motive,  but  because  it  is 
highly  important  for  the  convict  to  learn  and  feel  that 
he  owes  a  debt  for  his  past  iniquity  and  for  his  present 
support,  which  he  is  bound  in  reason  and  honesty  to 
pay.  The  next  largest  portion  should  be  appropriated, 
if  needed,  towards  the  relief  or  support  of  his  de 
pendent  family  during  his  detention,  that  he  may  learn 
the  blessing  which  labor  confers  of  making  others 
happy  whom  we  desire  to  benefit.  The  next  part,  to 
be  determined  according  to  fixed  rules,  in  a  certain 
proportion  to  industry  and  good  conduct,  should  be 
set  aside  to  accumulate,  if  not  forfeited  in  whole  or  in 
part  by  misconduct,  as  a  fund  to  be  used  and  enjoyed 
after  his  liberation ;  that  he  may  learn  the  next  lesson 
of  honest  and  thrifty  labor — to  deny  himself  for  the 
present  in  order  to  provide  for  the  future.  And, 


140  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

finally,  a  certain  small  surplus,  to  be  determined  in 
like  manner,  should  be  placed  at  his  immediate  control, 
as  a  means  of  purchasing  such  present  alleviations  and 
comforts  as  are  consistent  with  his  state  of  detention 
and  punishment;  that  he  may  learn  the  final  lesson  of 
labor  that  all  the  alleviations  and  comforts  of  a  hard 
life  are  the  proper  rewards  of  a  patient  and  persistent 
toil.  Thus  his  convict  labor  will  powerfully  tend  to 
his  practical  and  permanent  reformation. 

2.  It  may  be  proper,  in  the  second  place,  to  present 
in  one  view  the  benefits  of  such  reformatory  convict 
labor. 

(a.)  It  will  promote  the  health  and  well-being  of  the 
prisoners,  both  in  mind  and  body.  Without  some 
labor  bodily  health — and  without  such  labor,  mental 
health — must  terribly  suffer ;  a  kind  and  degree  of 
suffering  which  we  have  no  right  to  inflict. 

(6.)  It  will  promote  their  moral  improvement,  gradu 
ally  developing  the  power  of  self-control,  and  forming 
habits  of  provident  and  voluntary  effort  in  industry 
and  toil.  It  will  prepare  them  to  become  virtuous  and 
useful  members  of  society. 

(c.)  It  will  facilitate  the  preservation  of  good  order 
and  discipline  in  the  prison.  The  wise  management  of 
the  reserve  fund  and  of  the  present  reward  for  dili 
gence  and  good  conduct  will  enable  the  prison-keepers 
to  dispense,  in  almost  all  cases,  with  all  other  means  of 
enforcing  in  the  prison  the  rules  of  good  government. 


Pit  I  SON  ECONOMY.  141 

Thus  prison  life  will  be  divested  of  most  of  those  hor 
rible  abominations  which  so  often  render  it  a  means  of 
much  greater  evil  than  good. 

(d.)  It  will  give  the  convicts  the  essential  prepara 
tion  for  gaining  a  livelihood  after  their  release ;  first, 
by  forming  habits  of  voluntary  industry;  secondly,  by 
securing  a  little  fund  to  aid  them  during  the  critical 
period  of  transition  from  prison  to  social  life ;  and, 
thirdly,  by  instilling  a  moral  character  which  will  enable 
them  to  resist  the  temptations  of  their  old  associates 
and  commend  themselves  to  the  confidence  of  the 
community. 

(e.)  It  will  promote  the  good  of  the  state  ;  first,  in 
presenting  the  most  efficacious  example  to  deter  or 
wean  others  from  crime  ;  secondly,  in  diminishing  the 
expense  of  maintaining  prisons ;  thirdly,  in  preventing 
the  relapse  of  the  criminal ;  and,  fourthly,  in  adding  to 
the  resources  of  the  state  the  industry,  and  to  its  well- 
being  the  virtue,  of  another  citizen. 

3.  It  is  sometimes  objected  to  productive  convict 
labor  that  it  interferes  with  the  rights  and  interests  of 
labor  in  general. 

One  hardly  knows  where  to  begin  or  end  in  showing 
the  absurdity  of  such  an  objection.  It  belongs  to  the 
category  of  the  exploded  outcries  against  the  intro 
duction  of  labor-saving  machinery,  or  of  any  improve 
ments  in  the  processes  of  production,  whereby  it  was 
said  the  demand  for  laborers  would  be  diminished 
and  their  wages  reduced ;  whereas  it  has  turned  out 


142  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

that  just  the  contrary  has  been,  in   the  long  run,  the 
uniform  and  natural  result. 


We  have  seen  that,  whatever  may  be  the  effect  upon 
the  wages  of  labor,  or  upon  the  price  of  its  products, 
we  have  no  right,  instead  of  hanging  or  shooting  our 
fellow-men,  to  inflict  upon  them  the  outrageous  punish 
ment  of  incarcerating  them  for  years  in  solitary  cells 
without  any  occupation,  or,  still  worse,  of  shutting  them 
up  in  mixed  congregate  masses  of  all  sorts  of  crimi 
nals  and  leaving  them  in  sheer  idleness  to  make  one 
another  as  thoroughly  corrupt  and  diabolical  as  human 
nature  is  capable  of  becoming ;  and,  if  we  have  the 
right,  it  would  be  the  most  egregious  political  folly  to 
do  it.  Moreover,  we  have  seen  that  labor,  to  serve 
any  good  purpose,  must  be  productive.  We  meet  the 
objector,  then,  at  this  point ;  and  we  say  that,  accord 
ing  to  him,  when  this  labor  has  resulted  in  creating  a 
certain  amount  of  valuable  products,  it  would  be  more 
for  the  interest  of  society — if  the  interests  of  labor  and 
society  are  identical — that  all  those  products  should 
forthwith  be  committed  to  the  flames  or  cast  into  the 
sea,  than  that  they  should  be  preserved  and  applied  to 
their  appropriate  uses  !  If  it  is  rejoined  that  the  com 
petition  of  such  labor  is  unfair  because,  unlike  the  or 
dinary  laborer,  the  convict  is  supported  independently 
of  his  work  ;  we  have  only  to  say,  let  the  products  of 
prison  labor  be  disposed  of  at  public  auction  or  at 
market  rates,  and  no  one  has  a  right  to  complain  of 
the  competition  for  its  tendency  to  reduce  prices. 
Every  addition  to  the  supply  might  be  complained  of 
for  the  same  reason.  The  state,  not  the  convict,  is  the 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  143 

owner  of  the  articles ;  and  the  state  is  as  directly  inter 
ested  in  getting  the  highest  price  for  these  articles, 
that  thus  she  may  meet  the  expense  of  maintaining 
the  convict,  as  any  laborer  is  in  getting  the  highest 
price  for  his  products  to  meet  his  own  expenses. 

The  plain  state  of  the  case  is  this :  all  in  the  com 
munity  must  be  supported  ;  the  fewer  idlers,  therefore, 
to  be  supported  by  the  rest,  the  better  for  the  rest ; 
and  if  this  alleged  reduction  of  price  in  consequence 
of  this  competition  of  convict  labor  exists,  and  is  a  tax, 
it  is  the  smallest  tax  possible,  if  convicts  are  to  be  sup 
ported  at  all,  upon  the  labor  of  the  community — and 
upon  that  labor  all  taxes  must  ultimately  fall. 

v 

4.  The  laws  of  Pennsylvania  actually  require  pro 
vision  to  be  made  for  the  labor  of  all  convicts,  whether 
in  the  State  penitentiaries  or  in  the  county  prisons. 

For  the  penitentiaries,  it  is  required,  by  the  act  of 
3 ist  March,  1860,  that  "  whenever  any  person  shall  be 
sentenced  to  imprisonment  at  labor,  by  separate  or 
solitary  confinement,  for  any  period  not  less  than  one 
year,  the  imprisonment  and  labor  shall  be  had  and 
performed  in  the  State  penitentiary  for  the  proper 
district:  Provided,  That  nothing  in  this  section  con 
tained  shall  prevent  such  person  from  being  sentenced 
to  imprisonment  and  labor,  by  separate  or  solitary  con 
finement,  in  the  county  prisons  now  or  hereafter  author 
ized  by  law  to  receive  convicts  of  a  like  description." 
And,  by  the  act  of  23d  April,  1829,  it  is  required  of 
the  inspectors  that  "  they  shall  direct  the  manner  in 
which  raw  materials,  to  be  manufactured  by  the  con 
victs  in  said  prisons,  and  the  provisions  and  other 


144  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

supplies  for  the  prisons  shall  be  purchased,  and  also  the 
sale  of  all  articles  manufactured  in  said  prisons." 

For  the  county  jails,  it  is  declared,  by  the  act  of  5th 
April,  1 790,  that  "  the  malefactors  sentenced  to  hard 
labor  as  aforesaid,  in  the  several  counties  of  the  State, 
other  than  the  county  of  Philadelphia,  shall  be  em 
ployed  in  the  several  jails  and  workhouses  in  the 
respective  counties,  in  such  hard  and  servile  labor,  and 
fed  and  clothed  in  such  manner  as  is  hereinbefore  di 
rected  ;  and  the  duty  of  the  said 
keepers  shall  be  to  superintecd  and  direct  their  labors ; 
and  they  shall  have  authority  to  con 
fine,  in  close  durance,  apart  from  all  society,  all  those 
who  shall  refuse  to  labor,  or  be  idle,"  &c. 

"  The  keepers  of  the  jails  and  workhouses  or  houses 
of  correction,  shall,  once  in  every  three  months,  or 
oftener,  if  required,  furnish  the  commissioners  of  their 
respective  counties  with  a  complete  calendar  or  list  of 
all  persons  committed  to  their  respective  custody, 
under  sentence  of  such  servitude,  &c.  ;  * 
and  the  said  commissioners  shall,  at  the  charge  of  the 
proper  county,  provide  such  arti 

cles  and  materials  of  labor  and  manufacture  as  shall  be 
most  suitable  for  the  employment  of  all  those  who  are 
capable  of  labor  or  manufacture,  and  deliver  the  same 
to  the  said  jailor  or  workhouse-keeper,  taking  a  re 
ceipt  therefor ;  and  the  jailor  or  workhouse-keeper 
shall  render  an  account  quarterly,  or  oftener,  if  re 
quired,  to  the  commissioners,  of  the  work  done  by  the 
said  malefactors,  and  dispose  of  the  same  in  such  man 
ner  as  the  commissioners  shall  direct." 

"  If  any  jailor  shall  neglect  or  refuse  to  give  notice 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  145 

or  furnish  a  complete  calendar,  &c.,  * 

he  shall  forfeit  and  pay,  for  every  such  neglect  or  re 
fusal,  the  sum  of  one  hundred  dollars;  and  if  the  said 
commissioners  of  any  county,  after  the  receipt  of  such 
notice  or  calendar,  shall  neglect  or  refuse  to  procure 
sufficient  articles  and  materials  of  labor  and  manufac 
ture,  such  commissioners,  or  any 
of  them,  so  neglecting  or  refusing,  shall  forfeit  and  pay 
the  sum  of  one  hundred  dollars  for  every  such  neglect 
or  refusal." 

In  relation  to  the  Philadelphia  County  Prison,  similar 
provisions  are  made  by  special  statutes. 

Now  we  must  confess  that  the  language  of  the  stat 
utes  seems  rather  harsh  ;  yet  we  have  a  right  to  pre 
sume  that  the  terms  "hard  "  and  "  servile  "  labor  mean 
no  more  than  manual  labor  carried  to  the  extent  of 
bodily  fatigue.  We  admit,  also,  that  it  is  enforced 
labor  for  which  provision  is  made  by  the  law  ;  but 
even  enforced  labor,  whether  with  solitary  or  social 
confinement,  is  unspeakably  better  than  sheer  idleness, 
both  for  body  and  mind,  for  the  morals  and  the  future 
prospects  of  the  convicts.  But  when  the  prisons  are 
so  wretchedly  constructed  or  mismanaged  or  over 
crowded,  that  the  system  of  separate  confinement  is 
practically  abandoned,  and  the  convicts  are  mixed  pro 
miscuously  together,  or  thrown  into  cells  by  pairs  or  in 
companies  of  three,  four,  or  half  a  dozen,  and  these  left 
without  employment,  we  have  as  bad  a  system  as  could 
well  be  conceived.  If  the  worst  enemy  of  mankind 
were  to  invent  a  school  for  the  propagation  of  vice 
and  crime,  he  could  invent  no  better.  And,  alas,  not 
withstanding  the  stringent  provisions  of  the  statute, 


146  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

this  is,  to  an  alarming  extent,  the  condition  of  the 
county  jails  of  this  Commonwealth.  The  labor  de 
signed  by  the  statute  is  not  provided  for,  is  not  re 
quired,  is  not  performed.  The  convicts  are  defrauded 
of  the  employment  to  which  they  have  a  statutory  right. 
They  suffer  the  consequences,  and  the  State  must  suf 
fer  them  too. 

The  State  provides  for  labor — enforced  labor,  as  we 
have  said ;  but  this  is  not  all.  The  State  provides 
also  for  reformatory,  voluntary  labor,  both  in  the 
jails  and  in  the  penitentiaries.  The  State  declares 
that  "  it  shall  be  the  duty  of  the  inspectors,  sher 
iffs,  or  other  persons  having  charge  of  any  peniten 
tiary  or  jail  within  this  Commonwealth,  to  transmit 
to  the  secretary  thereof,  on  or  before  the  first  day 
of  February,  in  each  and  every  year,  a  full  state 
ment  in  detail  of  the  condition  of  such  penitentiary 
or  jail,  and  whether  an  oppor 

tunity  is  afforded  to  the  prisoners  for  doing  overwork, 
or  for  receiving  in  any  other  manner  the  profits  of  their 
labor"  Now  this  implies  that  the  "hard  and  servile 
labor  "  enforced  is  not  intended  to  be  of  so  extremely 
exacting  a  kind  as  might  be  imagined  ;  for  it  is  not 
to  be  supposed  that  the  State  would  mock  her  convicts. 
The  enforced  labor  leaves  time  and  strength  for  more 
work.  Certain  reasonable  tasks  being  presumed,  pro 
vision  is  made  for  "  overwork,"  for  voluntary  work  ; 
and  even  for  the  convict  receiving  in  other  ways,  as 
an  encouragement,  a  portion  of  the  profits  of  his  labor. 
The  statute  recognizes  the  principle  for  which  we  con 
tend,  the  beneficent  end  we  would  accomplish. 

What  is   needed   is :    First,  that  the  statute   should 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  147 

be  enforced,  so  that  its  beneficent  purpose  may  not  be 
frustrated  by  neglect  and  abuse  ;  and  secondly,  that 
further  provision  should  be  made  for  carrying  out  the 
principle  recognized,  by  improving  the  structure  and 
enlarging  the  capacity  of  the  county  prisons,  and  by 
expanding  the  sphere  of  voluntary  labor,  and  systema 
tizing  its  operation,  so  as  to  render  it  a  means  of 
general  and  permanent  reformation.  Such  a  means 
we  firmly  believe  it  might  be  made,  and  the  State  might 
rather  gain  than  lose  by  the  arrangement,  even  in  the 
lowest  pecuniary  point  of  view.  If  voluntary  were 
substituted  systematically  for  enforced  labor,  fixed 
rations  might  be  abolished  altogether,  and  the  prisoner 
required  to  earn  his  food,  as  well  as  his  other  privileges 
and  comforts. 

III.    INSTRUCTION    TO    CONVICTS. 

For  the  general  protection  of  the  community  against 
crime,  the  importance  of  instruction  in  the  case  of  the 
young  and  of  juvenile  offenders,  is,  at  least  in  theory, 
commonly  admitted.  One  after  another,  civilized  states 
are  waking  up  to  the  necessity  of  a  more  thorough  ap 
plication  of  the  theory  in  practical  legislation.  Our 
own  State  has  done  much  in  this  direction,  although  it 
must  be  admitted  much  more  remains  to  be  done. 

The  case  of  adults,  and  of  adults  already  criminal, 
is  more  difficult  and  less  hopeful.  They  have  habits- 
it  may  be  inveterate  habits — of  evil  to  be  eradicated; 
they  need  habits  of  good  to  be  initiated  and  confirmed  ; 
they  are  slow  to  apprehend  and  receive  the  lessons  of 
instruction,  and  quick  to  lose  what  they  have  learned ; 


148  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

in  them  the  valvular  system  has  been  inverted  so  that 
the  avenues  for  the  entrance  of  knowledge  and  of  good 
influences  are  almost  closed,  while  the  passage  for 
egress  and  leakage  are  open  and  free ;  they  resist 
good  impressions  like  a  surface  of  flint,  and  discharge 
them  like  gum-elastic.  All  this  is  extremely  discourag 
ing  ;  and  when  the  mass  of  criminals  is  looked  upon 
as  they  pass  through  the  hands  of  the  police  and  the 
dock  of  the  criminal  court  into  the  prison  cells,  no 
wonder  that  most  men  shake  their  heads  incredulously 
at  the  idea  of  their  possible  restoration  to  the  paths  of 
manly  virtue  and  the  companionship  of  good  society. 

There  is  much  truth,  though  quite  too  little  of  hope 
fulness,  in  the  nervous  utterance  of  an  Edinburgh 
police  detective : — 

"The  simple  truth  is,  that  punishment  hardens.  It 
is  forgotten  by  the  hopeful  people  that  it  is  clay  they 
have  to  work  upon,  not  gold ;  and,  therefore,  while 
they  are  passing  the  material  through  the  fire,  they  are 
making  bricks,  not  golden  crowns  of  righteousness. 
Enough,  too,  has  been  made  of  the  evident-enough 
fact,  that  they  must  continue  their  old  courses,  because 
there  is  no  asylum  for  them.  You  may  build  as 
many  asylums  as  you  please,  but  the  law  of  these 
strange  nurselings  of  society's  own  maternity  cannot  be 
changed  in  this  way.  I  say  nothing  of  God's  grace- 
that  is  above  my  comprehension  ;  but,  except  for  that, 
we  need  entertain  no  hope  of  the  repentance  and 
amendment  of  regular  thieves  and  robbers.  They 
have,  perhaps,  their  use.  They  can  be  made  examples 
of  to  others,  but  seldom  or  never  good  examples  to 
themselves.  That  they  will  always  exist  is,  I  fear,  fated ; 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  149 

but  modern  experience  tells  us  that  they  may  be  dimin 
ished  by  simply  drawing  them,  when  very  young,  within 
the  circle  of  civilization,  in  place  of  the  old  way  of  keep 
ing  them  out  of  it." 

We  would  not  say  a  word  to  diminish  the  motives 
for  carrying  out  this  last  suggestion,  or  to  detract  from 
its  force.  It  presents  the  true,  radical  remedy  for  the 
appalling  evil.  But  the  exception  which  the  policeman 
has  made  may  have  a  wider  and  deeper  significance 
than  he  seems  to  suppose.  That  "  grace,"  however 
incomprehensible  to  him  or  to  us,  furnishes  the  true 
point  aappui  for  all  our  efforts — it  is  neither  to  be 
despised  nor  ignored.  We  have  no  right  to  despair 
of  the  salvability  of  the  most  depraved  and  degraded 
men.  We  must  try  all  possible  means — more  than 
one  plan,  and  that  a  hackneyed  and  fruitless  plan- 
before  we  give  up  all  hope.  We  must  remember  that, 
if  these  "strange  nurselings  of  society's  own  maternity" 
are  what  and  where  they  are,  not  so  much  by  their 
own  fault  as  because  we  have  failed  to  draw  them  or 
to  attempt  "to  draw  them,  when  young,  within  the  cir 
cle  of  civilization,"  the  blame  for  their  condition  is  after 
all  more  our  own  than  theirs.  They  are  to  blame,  no 
doubt;  they  have  sinned;  they  must  be  punished; 
society  must  be  protected.  But,  if  society  punishes 
them,  she  must  punish  them,  not  with  pharisaic  inso 
lence,  disgust,  and  contempt,  but  in  a  spirit  of  regretful 
kindness,  and  with  an  earnest  and  honest  endeavor  to 
make  amends  to  them  for  her  past  neglect.  She  will 
best  protect  herself  by  reforming  them.  Hitherto  pun 
ishment  alone,  or  almost  alone,  has  been  tried — and 
"punishment  hardens."  Now  let  patient  instruction 


150  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

and  a  scheme  of  reformatory  influences  be  tried — 
I  Isystematically,  consistently,  and  perseveringly  tried — 
:  before  we  hopelessly  abandon  them  to  their  "fate." 
The  appeal  to  "  fate  "  is  quite  out  of  place.  Because 
disease  and  death  are  "  fated  "  always  to  remain  in  the 
world,  we  do  not  abandon  the  use  of  remedies.  Some 
sick  men  may  be  cured,  though  many  die.  Which 
may  be  saved  we  know  not ;  but  our  general  principle 
is,  that  while  there  is  life  there  is  hope.  Hitherto 
prisoners,  upon  their  discharge,  have  been  compelled 
to  "  continue  their  old  courses,  because  there  was  no 
asylum  for  them."  Let  us  then  provide  an  asylum  for 
them,  and  try  it.  Hitherto,  if  we  have  had  no  experi 
ence  of  drawing  back  to  the  circle  of  civilization  adult 
men  who  had  wandered  from  it,  it  is  because  the  effort 
has  not  been  seriously  and  patiently  made  upon  any 
principles  or  methods  affording  a  reasonable  promise 
of  success.  But  we  have  some  "  experience  "  of  men 
being  thus  drawn  back ;,  and  it  remains  for  us  to  study 
and  apply  the  principles  and  the  method  on  which  it 
has  been  done. 

The  shrewd  and  striking  statement  above  cited  has 
been  thus  enlarged  upon,  because  it  has  been  felt  that 
it  contains,  in  a  condensed  and  pointed  form,  an  ex 
pression  of  the  desponding  judgment,  which  is  quite 
too  prevalent  in  the  mass  of  the  distant  and  unobserv- 
ing  community,  sustained  by  the  dicta  of  some  of  the 
keenest  and  coolest  proximate  observers.  It  certainly 
needs  to  be  carefully  reconsidered. 

As  ignorance  and  the  want  of  a  right  education  are 
the  concomitant  causes  of  most  offenses  against 
society,  so  instruction  is  a  necessary  condition  of  the 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  151 

efficiency  of  any  scheme  of  reformation.  Any  scheme 
having  reformation  for  its  principal  or  even  incidental 
object  is  imperfect,  if  not  utterly  useless,  if  it  do  not 
contain  a  regular  and  permanent  provision  for  educa 
tion  in  knowledge  and  virtue.  The  old  rubbish  must 
be  removed  and  a  new  foundation  of  principles  must 
be  laid ;  a  new  set  of  motives  must  be  brought  into 
play;  the  intellect  must  be  aroused,  and  such  knowl 
edge  imparted  as  will  qualify  the  recipient  for  intelli 
gent  and  manly  occupation.  One  great  point  to  be 
reached  in  the  process  of  reformation  is  to  counteract 
in  the  will  the  natural  preference  of  present  enjoyment 
to  future  good.  To  produce  this  effect  the  mind  must 
be  improved  by  intellectual  instruction ;  it  must  be 
taught  that  there  are  other  pleasures  besides  those  of 
sense.  The  conscience  must  be  awakened  and  quick 
ened,  and  religion  must  be  brought  to  bear  its  part  in 
the  work  of  amelioration.  Her  lessons  must  furnish 
the  basis  for  all  the  rest ;  but  her  lessons  will  be  offered 
to  the  greatest  advantage,  when,  combined  with  in 
struction  in  useful  knowledge,  they  are  offered  as  they 
should  be;  not  as  a  part  of  the  sentence  of  punish 
ment,  but  as  an  alleviation  of  its  rigor.  Bodily  exer 
cise  will  profit  little.  It  is  the  mind,  the  soul,  of  the 
convict  that  is  to  be  gained. 

"  Let  it  not  be  said  that  the  idea  of  moral  reclama 
tion  is  too  refined  to  be  adapted  to  depraved  and 
degraded  convicts.  Convicts  are  men.  The  most  de 
praved  and  degraded  are  men  ;  their  minds  are  moved 
by  the  same  springs  that  give  activity  to  those  of 
others  ;  they  avoid  pain  with  the  same  care  and  pursue 
pleasure  with  the  same  avidity  that  actuate  their  fellow- 


I52  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

mortals.  It  is  the  false  direction  only  of  these  great 
motives  that  produces  the  criminal  actions  which  they 
prompt.  To  turn  them  into  a  course  that  will  pro 
mote  the  true  happiness  of  the  individual,  by  making 
him  cease  to  injure  that  of  society,  should  be  the  great 
object  of  penal  jurisprudence.  The  error,  it  appears, 
lies  in  considering  them  as  beings  of  a  nature  so  in 
ferior  as  to  be  incapable  of  elevation,  and  so  bad  as  to 
make  any  amelioration  impossible  ;  but  crime  is  the 
effect  principally  of  intemperance,  idleness,  ignorance, 
vicious  associations,  irreligion,  and  poverty, — not  of  any 
defective  natural  organization ;  and  the  laws  which 
permit  the  unrestrained  and  continual  exercise  of  these 
causes  are  themselves  the  sources  of  those  excesses 
which  legislators,  to  cover  their  own  inattention  or  ig 
norance  or  indolence,  impiously  and  falsely  ascribe  to 
the  Supreme  Being,  as  if  he  had  created  man  incapable 
of  receiving  the  impressions  of  good.  Let  us  try  the 
experiment  before  we  pronounce  that  even  the  de 
graded  convict  cannot  be  reclaimed.  It  has  never  yet 
been  tried." 

When,  in  spite  of  ample  knowledge  and  instruction 
before  received,  men  have  committed  crimes  and  be 
come  hardened  in  wickedness, — and  we  must  admit 
that  this  is  sometimes  the  sad  and  chilling  fact, — their 
case  is  indeed  almost,  but  not  quite,  desperate.  All 
possible  remedies  must  be  tried  before  we  give  them 
up  for  lost ;  and  can  we  tell  when  the  bounds  of  pos 
sibility  have  been  reached  ?  Line  upon  line,  line 
upon  line,  precept  upon  precept,  precept  upon  precept ; 
the  same  old  means  must  be  renewed  and  repeated 
under  a  change  of  circumstances,  which  we  may  hope 


PRISON  E  CONOMY.  I  5  3 

to  be  more  favorable.  And  if,  after  years  of  earnest, 
kindly,  faithful,  and  patient  trial,  all  means  fail  to  ac 
complish  the  hoped-for  and  hopeful  amendment  of  the 
hardened  convict,  what  then  ?  Having  served  out  a 
certain  term  of  imprisonment  in  sullen  obstinacy  or 
with  increasing  irritation  of  malice  against  society— 
for  if  he  has  not  been  made  better  by  his  incarcera 
tion,  he  has  probably  been  made  worse, — shall  he  be 
forthwith  discharged  upon  the  community  to  renew  his 
career  of  crime  and  iniquity?  What  folly  or  incon 
sistency  could  be  greater  ?  Let  those,  therefore,  who 
so  readily  set  convicts  down  as  irreclaimable,  remem 
ber  that  if  such  be  the  fact,  then  the  only  reasonable 
course  to  pursue  with  them  is,  either  to  put  them  to 
death  and  be  rid  of  them,  or  to  keep  them  under 
restraint  as  long  as  they  live,  and  that  without 
wasting  the  slightest  thought  or  effort  for  their  re 
formation.  If  we  shrink  from  thus  summarily  deciding 
their  destiny  for  time  and  eternity,  either  by  taking 
their  lives  or  by  shutting  them  up  in  the  dungeon 
of  despair,  what  remains  but  that — leaving  a  ray  of 
hope  to  penetrate  to  the  mind  of  the  convict,  which  we 
ourselves  may  fail  to  perceive — we  should  keep  him  in 
restraint,  not  until  he  shall  die,  but  until  he  shall  be 
reformed  ;  and  then  faithfully  use  all  possible  means 
for  his  reformation  as  long  as  his  incarceration  lasts  ? 
At  all  events,  such  a  convict  should  not  be  released 
until  he  is  reformed.  To  suppose  that  his  imprison 
ment,  without  such  a  result,  is  going  to  deter  him  or 
others  from  the  commission  of  crime  in  the  future,  is 
one  of  the  greatest  and  strangest  of  mistakes.  For 
himself,  such  a  released  convict  may  have  become  more 


154  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

cunning,  but  will  not  be  less  persistent  in  his  career  of 
crime ;  and  by  his  busy  and  crafty  efforts,  and  bravado 
of  heroism,  he  will  do  incomparably  more  to  incite  and 
encourage  and  train  others  in  similar  courses,  than  all 
that  his  temporary  incarceration  will  do  to  deter  them. 
Let  us  not  be  too  ready  to  pronounce  any  criminals 
absolutely  incorrigible,  until  we  have  made  a  fair  trial 
for  their  reformation  ;  or,  if  we  really  have  such  in- 
corrigibles  on  hand,  let  us  by  no  means  turn  them 
loose  again  to  prey  upon  society. 

The  proper  view  of  the  case  is  that  all  convicts  are 
the  wards  of  the  state,  and  when  they  are  discharged 
are  to  be  discharged  better  than  they  came,  prepared 
to  be  good  citizens.  To  this  end  they  must  be  in 
structed,  and  the  state  having  deprived  them  of  their 
liberty,  and  assumed  the  control  of  them  to  herself,  is 
morally  bound  to  give  them  such  instruction  as  is 
fitted  and  needed  to  attain  that  end.  Such  instruction 

1.  Will  instil  and  enforce  good  principles,  the  great 
est  need  of  all. 

2.  Will  awaken  the  hope  of  something  better  to  be 
attained  in  the  future. 

3.  Will  give  birth  to  a  sentiment  of  self-respect, — a 
feeling  in  the  convict's  mind  that,  after  all,   there   is 
something  in  him  too  precious  to  degrade  and  lose, — a 
feeling  which  is  one  of  the  mightiest  levers  of  moral 
and  social  elevation. 

4.  Will  furnish  or  increase  the  power  of  honest  self- 
support  after  his  release. 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  155 

The  subjects  of  such  instruction  will  be  found — 

1 .  In  some  trade  or  handicraft,  if  needed. 

2.  In  the  elements  of  learning ;  in  reading,  writing, 
&c.,  if  needed. 

3.  In  further  intellectual  training  and  employment, 
as  there  may  be  a  capacity  and  a  readiness  for  it. 

4.  In  habits  of  economy  and  of  good  morals. 

5.  In  religion  ;  which  alone  must  furnish   the  funda 
mental  and  crowning  motives  for  a  reformed  and  useful 
life. 

The  method  of  instruction  must  be  adapted  to  the 
peculiar  case  we  have  to  deal  with.  It  is  not  children 
but  adults  that  are  to  be  taught ;  it  is  with  the  pervert 
ed  minds  of  criminals  and  not  with  the  ingenuous  minds 
of  virtuous  men  that  we  have  to  do  ;  our  lessons  are 
addressed  to  persons  under  restraint  and  not  to  free 
men.  Under  such  circumstances  the  ordinary  methods 
of  school  instruction  must  be  expected  to  prove  failures; 
prisoners  will  not  perform  literary  tasks  like  children. 
Teaching  by  lectures,  too,  cannot  be  successfully  used 
without  many  special  cautions  and  modifications.  We 
must  be  prepared  in  any  event  for  unusual  and  extreme 
trials  of  patience.  Our  methods  must  be  largely  in 
formal  and  different  for  different  cases ;  there  must  be 
a  vast  deal  of  labor  in  detail,  of  individual,  personal 
effort.  And  especially  must  the  method  of  instruction 
vary  according  to  the  progressive  stages  of  general 


I  5  6  PRISON  E  CO  NO  MY. 

improvement,  and  to  the  degree  of  confidence  which  may 
already  be  reposed  in  the  different  classes  of  prisoners. 
No  particular  rules  of  method,  therefore,  can  be  laid 
down.  We  can  only  say  that,  while  ordinary  scholastic 
methods  are  mostly  out  of  place,  a  person  of  good  sense 
and  discretion,  of  kind  feelings  and  patient  temper, 
penetrated  with  a  deep  interest  in  the  personal  welfare 
of  the  convicts,  and  possessed  with  an  earnest  faith  in 
his  work,  an  assurance  and  a  determination  that  it  shall 
succeed,  such  a  person  will  not  be  long  in  finding  the 
true  method,  and  cannot  fail  in  the  use  of  it.  The  spirit 
is  everything,  here,  as  an  element  of  success. 

We  must  again  repeat  that  such  kindly  reformatory 
instruction  is  not  at  all  incompatible  with  the  idea  of 
restraint  or  punishment.  It  leaves  that  punishment 
and  restraint  just  as  they  were ;  it  is  itself  based  upon 
them  as  its  own  necessary  condition  ;  and  one  of  its 
greatest  lessons  is  to  impress  upon  the  mind  and 
conscience  of  the  convict  the  justice  of  his  penalty. 
Nor  is  such  instruction  incompatible  with  the  fullest 
deterring  power  of  punishment ;  for,  if  unsuccessful, 
that  punishment  should  still  be  continued  ;  it  is  only 
when  the  instruction  is  successful  and  ends  in  the  con 
vict's  reformation,  that  he  is  released.  And  surely 
nothing  could  more  effectually  deter  the  criminally  dis 
posed  from  the  commission  of  crime  than  the  practical 
assurance  that  in  case  of  its  commission,  he  will  be 
placed  under  penal  restraint  from  which  there  is  no 
release  until,  by  a  course  of  instruction  and  discipline 
accompanying  it,  he  is  transformed  into  a  virtuous  man 
and  fitted  for  the  duties  of  free  society. 

The  particular  principle  of  instruction,  as  well  as  the 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  157 

general  principle  of  reformation — and  the  two  run  into 
each  other  as  elements  of  prison  discipline — has  been 
already  recognized  by  the  statutes  of  this  Common 
wealth. 

The  statute  in  regard  both  to  jails  and  penitentiaries 
requires  an  annual  report  to  be  rendered  as  to  "  what 
provision  is  made  for  the  instruction  of  prisoners  in 
such  penitentiary  or  jail."  The  statute  already  cited, 
relating  to  the  duties  of  the  matron  in  the  Philadelphia 
County  Prison,  recognizes  and  enjoins  the  duty  of 
giving  to  prisoners  "  such  instruction  as  may  tend  to 
their  reformation,  and  to  render  them  useful  members 
of  society."  In  the  penitentiaries  the  statute  estab 
lishes  the  distinct  office  of  "  religious  instructor ;  "  and 
we  repeat  its  declaration,  that  "  it  shall  be  his  duty  to 
attend  to  the  moral  and  religious  instruction  of  the 
convicts,  in  such  a  manner  as  to  make  their  confine 
ment,  as  far  as  possible,  a  means  of  their  reformation, 
so  that  when  restored  to  their  liberty,  they  may  prove 
honest,  industrious,  and  useful  members  of  society." 

With  such  principles  avowed,  what  is  needed  is  a 
faithful  and  thorough  enforcement  of  the  existing  law, 
with  such  an  enlargement  of  the  statutory  provisions, 
such  an  increase  of  appliances,  such  improvements  of 
method,  and  such  a  consistent,  systematic,  and  perse 
vering  working  out  of  the  whole  scheme,  as  shall 
not  leave  it  a  mere  barren  excrescence,  but  shall  secure 
to  it  that  degree  of  success  which  we  have  reason 
to  expect,  and  which  the  public  good  imperatively 
requires. 


158  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

IV.    KIND    TREATMENT    OF    CONVICTS. 

This  is  due  from  officials,  and  is  commonly  accorded, 
even  to  prisoners  guilty  of  the  most  shocking  crimes 
and  condemned  to  suffer  the  severest  punishment,  and 
even  in  the  very  act  of  inflicting  upon  such  persons  the 
extreme  penalty  of  the  law.  There  are  none  of  us 
who  would  not  be  scandalized  at  the  conduct  of  any 
warden  or  jailor  or  sheriff  or  other  officer,  were  he 
wantonly  to  indulge  in  any  violent  or  taunting  acts  or 
words  towards  such  a  convict  under  such  circumstances, 
or  in  any  harsh  or  opprobrious  treatment,  one  hair's 
breadth  beyond  the  strict  requirements  of  the  law  and 
the  sentence  of  the  court.  This  is  sufficient  to  show 
that  kind  and  humane  treatment  on  the  part  of  officials 
is  perfectly  compatible  with  the  infliction  of  condign 
punishment. 

It  is  a  great  mistake  to  suppose  that  when  a  man 
has  been  condemned  to  imprisonment  for  his  crimes, 
his  jailor  is  required  to  carry  out  the  analogy  of  the 
lazv,  by  the  most  unfeeling,  rigorous,  and  contumelious 
treatment ;  that  he  is  conscientiously  bound  to  shut  up 
his  bowels  of  compassion,  if  he  has  any  ;  to  abstain 
from  any  kindly  personal  interest  in  the  convict,  from 
all  the  amenities,  courtesies,  and  charities  of  human 
intercourse,  and,  instead  of  recognizing  in  his  ward  a 
fellow-man,  to  hold  him  at  a  distance  as  a  detestable 
outcast,  a  venomous  viper,  or  a  malignant  fiend.  The 
truth  is,  the  law  neither  requires  nor  sanctions  any 
such  duties  by  way  of  analogy,  any  such  discretionary 
and  arbitrary  inflictions,  or  methods  of  re-enforcing  its 
own  inflictions.  It  prescribes  the  precise  punishment 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  159 

it  would  impose,  and  does  not  authorize  any  man  to 
aggravate  it  by  "one  jot  or  tittle."  The  wardens  and 
keepers  of  prisons  are  no  more  to  add,  directly  or  in 
directly,  properly  or  constructively,  in  kind  or  degree, 
to  the  punishment  denounced  by  the  law,  than  to 
release  from  it  or  relax  its  severity ;  and  any  unneces 
sary  exercise  of  acerbity  or  rigor  in  the  mode  of 
administration,  any  unfeeling  exhibition  of  scorn  or 
contempt,  is  as  much  an  addition  to  the  punishment  as 
an  increase  of  its  term  would  be. 

Nor,  on  the  other  hand,  are  prison-keepers  mere 
heartless  or  soulless  machines,  to  execute  with  mechani 
cal  precision  the  punishment  imposed;  but  they  are 
moral  agents,  human  beings,  of  like  passions  with  those 
placed  under  their  charge,  and  it  is  intended  by  law 
that  they  should,  by  all  means,  retain  and  not  put  off 
this  character,  for  they  are  to  represent,  not  so  much 
the  majesty  or  the  severity,  as  the  spirit  of  the  state  in 
punishing,  and  this  is  a  spirit  of  kindness  and  good 
will,  not  of  vindictiveness  or  contempt  or  unfeeling 
cruelty.  The  punishment  is  necessary  and  must  be 
inflicted — inflicted  in  its  full  measure  and  rigor,  yet 
more  in  sorrow  than  in  anger,  and  with  a  manifest 
desire,  not  to  degrade  and  crush,  but  to  encourage, 
elevate,  and  save. 

The  evil  consequences  of  the  harsh  and  unfeeling 
treatment  of  prisoners  can  scarcely  be  exaggerated. 
By  it  every  movement  towards  good  in  them  is  re 
pressed,  and  everything  that  is  bad  in  them  is  excited 
and  provoked  to  its  fullest  intensity.  At  best  they  are 
cowed  down  and  lose  the  last  remnants  of  manly 
aspiration  which  crime  had  left  in  their  bosoms.  Their 


160  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

worst  passions  are  kept  in  exercise  or  only  under 
sullen  constraint,  and  it  will  be  well  if  through  constant 
irritation,  and  the  pent-up  accumulation  of  revengeful 
feelings,  the  discontent  with  society  and  with  them 
selves,  with  which  they  entered  the  prison,  is  not 
changed  to  a  fixed  and  inveterate  malignity  or  despe 
ration  before  their  release  ;  so  that  they  will  be  dis 
charged  upon  the  community  hardened,  infuriated, 
and  intensified  in  wicked  purposes,  to  pursue  with 
tenfold  earnestness  their  career  of  vice  and  crime. 
Thus  our  prisons  become  gymnasia  and  seminaries 
for  the  most  thorough  discipline  and  development  of 
criminal  character.  Thus  ''punishment  hardens." 

It  may  be  said  that  the  crushing  and  unmitigated 
punishment  thus  inflicted,  with  all  these  circumstances 
of  contumely,  opprobrium,  of  repellent  scorn  and 
unfeeling  rigor,  of  cruel  and  insolent  asperity,  will 
be  the  more  fearful  example  to  deter  others  from  the 
commission  of  crime.  But  is  that  punishment  likely  to 
deter  others  from  crime,  which  does  not  deter  him  who 
suffers  it?  that  punishment  which  rather  confirms  and 
hardens  him  in  wickedness  ?  If  so,  it  must  be  because 
those  others  are  more  afraid  of  becoming  confirmed 
and  thorough-bred  criminals  than  they  are  of  the  pun 
ishment;  and  thus  our  simplest  plan  would  be  to  make 
every  criminal  that  should  fall  into  our  hands  as  bad  as 
possible  in  the  shortest  way,  and  then  hold  up  the  re 
sult  as  an  example  to  frighten  others  from  entering 
upon  a  course  which  should  lead  to  such  an  end  ; 
somewhat  as  the  ancient  Spartans  are  said  to  have 
made  their  slaves  drunk  that  the  degrading  spectacle 
might  deter  their  children  from  intoxication.  But  then 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  161 

who  would  be  responsible  for  the  education  of  those 
adepts  and  inveterates  in  crime  ?  The  state  cannot 
afford  to  incur  such  a  responsibility,  especially  since  in 
curring  it  would,  according  to  the  known  principles  of 
human  nature,  infallibly  fail  of  the  ulterior  end  referred 
to.  Such  a  punishment,  with  such  a  result,  would 
deter  nobody  from  crime.  Both  duty  and  interest 
equally  and  imperatively  require  that  the  state  should, 
if  possible,  secure  the  reformation  of  the  criminals 
whom  it  punishes. 

But  if  reformation  is  to  be  made  at  all  an  end  of 
prison  discipline,  humane  treatment,  a  spirit  of  kind 
ness  and  sympathy  towards  the  convicts,  the  practical 
manifestation  of  a  real  personal  interest  in  them  and 
their  improvement,  is  the  essential  condition,  the  very 
key  to  any  effectual  scheme  for  that  purpose.  Without 
it,  all  other  appliances  and  contrivances  will  be  in  vain  ; 
success  is  impossible.  Whatever  other  qualifications  a 
prison-keeper  may  have,  he  is  unfit  for  his  place  unless 
he  possesses  a  genuine  kindliness  of  nature,  a  spirit  of 
compassionate  sympathy,  faith  in  humanity,  a  profound 
respect  and  regard  for  man  as  man,  however  fallen  and 
degraded,  an  earnest,  patient,  indomitable  purpose  to 
reclaim  and  raise  the  wretched  and  guilty  outcasts  com 
mitted  to  his  care.  The  precise  point  is  to  rekindle 
the  dormant  spark  of  humanity  in  the  breast  of  the 
criminal,  to  develop  a  spirit  of  manliness  and  of  human 
kindness ;  and  to  this  end  he  must  be  treated  with  hu 
man  kindness,  and  his  manhood  must  be  recognized. 

The  want  of  proper  interest  in  the  prisoners  com 
mitted  to  their  charge,  if  not  so  great  a  fault  as  posi 
tively  cruel  treatment,  is  a  much  more  general  defect, 


1 62  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

and  one,  therefore,  which  may  practically  result  in  a 
much  greater  amount  of  evil.  Prisoners  probably  suf 
fer  more  from  mere  neglect  than  from  harshness  or 
personal  abuse.  The  sheriff  or  the  jailor  puts  the  con 
vict  into  the  cell  or  the  common  prison,  locks  the  door? 
sees  that  he  is  kept  safely  and  is  properly  fed ;  and,  for 
the  rest,  leaves  him  "to  make  the  best  of  it." 

Prisoners  need  positive  and  kindly  attention  ;  and 
that  positive  efforts  be  made  for  their  present  well- 
being  and  their  eventual  reform.  The  consciousness 
of  this  on  their  part  will  furnish  the  strongest  support 
in  the  struggle  for  their  reformation.  They  are  not 
likely  to  work  it  out  by  their  own  suggestions,  or  from 
the  mere  influence  of  detention. 

Criminals  are  not  ordinarily  beyond  the  reach  of 
good  influences,  yet  criminals  in  crowds  are  annually 
discharged  through  mere  flux  of  time,  who  are  pro 
claimed  altogether  incorrigible.  But  it  has  been  de 
nied,  on  the  ground  of  actual  experiment,  that  there 
are  any  such  whatever.  The  preliminary  report  of  the 
United  States  Commissioner  to  the  late  International 
Prison  Congress  contains  the  following  just  and  weighty 
suggestions : — 

"  There  are  many  prisoners  weak,  and  some  de 
plorably  wicked ;  but  so  long  as  Divine  Providence  is 
pleased  to  retain  men  in  this  world  of  probation  at  all, 
our  right  may  well  be  disputed  to  regard  or  pronounce 
any  to  be  irreclaimable.  Our  duty  is  first  to  try  some 
new  method  ;  to  try  indeed  any  and  all  hopeful  methods 
to  reclaim  them.  But  under  present  notions  we  reject 
all  rational  means  of  promoting  their  recovery ;  and, 
then  failing  (rather  the  means  we  do  use  failing),  we 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  163 

quietly  pronounce  them  irreclaimable  ;  just  as  an  en 
gineer  might  do,  who,  when  charged  to  reduce  a  strong 
fort,  should  fling  away  his  trenching  tools  and  pronounce 
it  impregnable.  In  such  a  case,  with  whom  really  lies 
the  blame,  the  prison  officers  or  the  prison  inmates  ? 
And  which  are  the  irreclaimable,  while  such  a  system 
is  persisted  in  ?  It  was  the  opinion  of  an  able  writer, 
and  equally  able  as  well  as  successful  prison  manager, 
that  prisoners  could  be  saved  to  a  man  by  the  applica 
tion  of  right  principles  and  methods  in  prison  adminis 
tration.  He  feared  neither  bad  habits  nor  any  other 
difficulties.  He  believed  that  while  life  and  sanity  are 
spared,  recovery  is  always  possible,  if  properly  sought. 
There  is  infinite  elasticity  in  the  human  mind  if  its  fac 
ulties  are  placed  in  healthful  action,  and  neither  dis 
eased  by  maltreatment  nor  locked  up  in  the  torpor  of 
a  living  grave." 

We  have  the  assurance  of  this  same  prison  manager 
that  his  remarkable  success  was  not  the  mere  result  of 
peculiar  personal  qualities  : — "  My  task,"  says  he,  "  was 
not  really  as  difficult  as  it  appeared.  I  was  working 
with  nature  and  not  against  her,  as  all  other  prison 
systems  do.  I  was  endeavoring  to  cherish,  and  yet 
direct  and  regulate,  those  cravings  for  amelioration  of 
position,  which  almost  all  possess  in  some  degree,  and 
which  are  often  strongest  in  those  otherwise  most 
abused.  Under  the  guidance  of  right  principles,  they 
rose  easily  to  order  and  exertion.  I  did  not  neglect 
the  object  of  punishment  in  my  various  arrangements, 
but  I  sought  it  in  the  limits  assigned  alike  by  the  letter 
and  spirit  of  the  law,  not  by  excesses  of  authority  be 
yond  them.  The  law  imposes  imprisonment  and  hard 


1 64  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

labor,  and  these,  in  the  fullest  sense  of  the  words,  my 
men  endured.  Every  one  of  them  performed  his 
government  task,"  and,  besides,  his  other  voluntary 
labor  as  he  could  catch  opportunity.  "  But  he  was 
saved,  as  far  as  I  could  save  him,  from  unnecessary 
humiliation,  and  encouraged  to  look  to  his  own  steady 
efforts  for  ultimate  liberation  and  improved  position. 
And  this — not  the  efforts  of  an  individual,  zealous  as 
they  certainly  were — was  the  real  secret  of  success." 

Such  are  the  views  of  the  most  intelligent,  experi 
enced,  and  close  observers  of  prison  discipline,  in  ref 
erence  to  its  existing  deficiencies,  and  the  proper 
principles  and  methods  of  reform.  Such  are  the  pre 
vailing  tendencies  of  opinion  among  the  most  thought 
ful  men.  Such  are  the  results  at  which  our  advancing 

o 

civilization  evidently  aims,  and  which  it  will  eventually — 
and  that  at  no  distant  period — accomplish.  That  is 
to  say,  the  attempt  will  be  made,  and,  if  made,  there 
can  be  no  doubt  of  a  reasonable  degree  of  success. 
Absolute  success  may  not  be  attainable,  and  should 
neither  be  promised  nor  expected. 

The  best  and  wisest  of  prison-keepers  will  still  be 
imperfect  intellectually  and  morally ;  and  the  best  and 
wisest  are  but  few.  Even  if  they  were  many  and, 
besides,  were  perfect,  some  criminals  might  not  be 
saved  by  their  treatment,  however  kind  and  judicious. 
We  need  not  hold  that  there  are  absolutely  no  "  incor- 
rigibles."  But  more  will  be  reformed  in  this  way  than 
in  any  other. 

The  experiment  has  been  repeatedly  tried  by  Maco- 
nochie,  by  Crofton,  and  many  others ;  and  always  with 
the  most  encouraging  degree  of  success.  That  per- 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  1 65 

feet  success  is  unlikely  is  no  objection  to  any  plan  for 
the  government  or  improvement  of  mankind.  If  it 
were,  then  one  thing  is  plain  :  our  whole  cumbrous 
system  and  expensive  machinery  of  penal  jurispru 
dence  should  be  instantly  and  utterly  abolished  ;  for  it 
is  patent  and  notorious  that  it  has  ever  fallen  far  short 
of  perfect  success.  Legal  penalties  have  never  swept 
away  crime  from  human  society  ;  but  we  do  not,  there 
fore,  propose  their  abolition.  They  may  have  done 
something  towards  the  desired  end.  We  propose  an 
improvement  of  their  mode  of  administration,  whereby 
they  would  accomplish  vastly  more.  But,  after  all, 
much  will  undoubtedly  remain  unaccomplished  ;  much 
that  will  lie  quite  beyond  the  power  and  ingenuity  of 
man  to  effect.  "  Let  us  do  what  we  can. 

V.    CLASSIFICATION    OF    PRISONERS. 

Classification  is  not  needed  so  long  and  so  far  as  the 
separate  system  of  confinement  is  absolutely  adhered 
to.  Each  prisoner  is  then  dealt  with  by  himself,  and 
on  his  own  separate  merits.  But  separate  or  solitary 
confinement  has  never  been  practically  introduced,  nor, 
so  far  as  we  know,  has  it  ever  been,  even  in  theory, 
seriously  proposed,  for  all  persons  under  penal  re 
straint,  whatever  their  sex,  age,  or  degree  of  crimi 
nality.  Houses  of  correction  for  adults,  and  houses  of 
refuge  for  juvenile  offenders,  have  always  been  ar 
ranged  on  a  different  principle.  Usually,  convicts 
confined  for  minor  offenses  and  for  shorter  periods  are 
allowed  more  or  less  of  companionship  ;  and  if  so,  the 
sexes  are  separated,  or  ought  to  be.  Some  degree  of 


1 66  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

classification,  therefore,  seems  to  have  been  generally 
admitted  to  be  proper  and  necessary.  In  the  Western 
Penitentiary  of  this  State,  the  separate  system  is  by 
law  allowed  to  be  modified.  The  inspectors  of  the 
Philadelphia  County  Prison,  in  their  last  report,  tell  us 
that  "  the  separate  system,  once  the  pride  of  Pennsyl 
vania,  has  been  long  abandoned  in  every  department 
of  the  prison,  and  even  in  the  convict  corridors  two, 
three,  and  even  four  prisoners  are  placed  together 
in  a  single  cell."  The  history  of  the  past  and  the 
present  state  of  facts  compel  us  to  assume  that  the 
separate  system  will  not,  in  the  future,  be  thoroughly 
and  universally  carried  out  in  this  State.  And  if  not, 
the  classification  of  prisoners  becomes  a  matter  of  most 
serious  moment.  Taking-  things  as  they  are,  its  wider 
application  would,  in  our  judgment,  be  productive  of 
the  most  important  and  beneficial  consequences.  From 
this  point  of  view  we  propose  to  pursue  the  discussion 
of  the  subject — that  is  to  say,  taking  things  as  they  are, 
and  supposing  that  the  separate  system  will  not  be  uni 
versally  and  thoroughly  carried  out. 

Not  a  word  need  be  said  to  show  the  unutterable 
absurdity  and  the  terrible  consequences  of  the  free 
mingling  together  of  all  sorts  of  prisoners,  or  of  thrust 
ing  them,  indiscriminately,  by  the  couple  or  the  half 
dozen,  into  the  same  cell.  Nothing  could  be  more 
utterly  subversive  of  all  the  purposes  of  punishment, 
whether  exemplary  or  reformatory.  No  better  con 
trivance  could  be  invented  for  giving  vice  the  fullest 
opportunity  for  fermenting  and  festering  and  propa 
gating  its  contagion.  Prisons  thus  become  training- 
schools  for  crime.  As  far  as  reformation  is  concerned, 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  167 

such  prisons  are  like  hospitals  in  which  all  sorts  of  pa 
tients,  with  all  sorts  of  diseases,  from  the  plague,  the 
small-pox,  the  cholera,  the  typhus  and  yellow  fever, 
down  to  the  rheumatism,  asthma,  catarrh,  gout,  or  dys 
pepsia,  should  be  indiscriminately  huddled  together  in 
the  same  wards,  and  even  in  the  same  cots. 

Leaving  aside,  therefore,  this  extreme  case  of  the 
neglect  of  classification,  which  finds  no  defenders,  we 
proceed  to  say  that  this  same  neglect  is  the  occasion  of 
many  and  capital  defects  in  the  "congregate  system"  of 
prison  discipline,  as  it  ordinarily  exists,  even  under  its 
best  methods  of  management,  and  under  the  most  fa 
vorable  circumstances.  To  remedy  these  defects,  not 
only  must  the  labor  of  the  convicts  be  made  voluntary, 
instead  of  being  enforced  by  the  lash,  but  their  classifi 
cation  must  be  carried  out  so  far  that  the  members  of 
the  several  parties  or  companies  or  squads  shall  be 
left,  and  safely  left,  to  very  great,  if  not  perfect,  free 
dom  of  intercourse,  as  in  ordinary  social  occupation. 

Such  a  classification  has  sometimes  been  alleged  to 
be  impossible  consistently  with  the  purpose  of  refor 
mation.  By  no  one  has  the  objection  been  placed  in  a 
stronger  light  than  by  Mr.  Livingston.  His  views  are 
thus  expressed : — 

"  To  remedy  this  evil  (i.  e.,  the  corrupting  conse 
quences  of  indiscriminate  intercourse),  what  is  called 
classification  was  first  resorted  to ;  first,  the  young 
were  separated  from  the  old  ;  then  the  analogous  divi 
sion  was  made  between  the  novice  and  the  practiced 
offender.  Further  sub-divisions  were  found  indispen 
sable,  in  proportion  as  it  was  discovered  that  in  each 
of  these  classes  would  be  found  individuals  of  different 


1 68  PRISON  E  CONOMY. 

degrees  of  depravity,  and,  of  course,  corruptors,  and 
those  ready  to  receive  their  lessons.  Accordingly, 
classes  were  multiplied,  until,  in  some  prisons  in  Eng 
land,  we  find  them  amounting  to.  fifteen  or  more.  But 
all  this  while  the  evident  truths  seemed  not  to  have 
had  proper  force  :  First,  that  moral  guilt  cannot  always 
be  discovered,  and,  if  discovered,  so  nicely  appreciated 
as  to  assign  to  each  one  infected  with  it  its  compara 
tive  place  in  the  scale  ;  and  that,  if  it  could  be  so  dis 
covered  [appreciated],  it  would  be  found  that  no  two 
would  be  found  contaminated  in  the  same  degree. 
Secondly,  that  if  these  difficulties  could  be  surmounted, 
and  a  class  could  be  formed  of  individuals  who  had 
advanced  exactly  to  the  same  point,  not  only  of  offense 
but  of  moral  depravity,  still  their  association  would 
produce  a  further  progress  in  both,  just  as  sparks  pro 
duce  a  flame  when  brought  together,  which,  separated, 
would  be  extinguished  and  die.  %  It  is  not  in  human 
nature  for  the  mind  to  be  stationary.  It  must  pro 
gress  in  virtue  or  in  vice.  Nothing  promotes  this 
progress  so  much  as  the  emulation  created  by  society; 
and  from  the  nature  of  the  society  will  it  receive  its 
direction.  Every  association  of  convicts,  then,  that 
can  be  formed,  will,  in  a  greater  or  less  degree,  per 
vert,  but  will  never  reform,  those  of  which  it  is  com 
posed  ;  and  we  are  brought  to  the  irresistible  conclu 
sion  that  classification  once  admitted  to  be  useful,  it  is 
so  in  an  inverse  proportion  to  the  numbers  of  which 
each  class  is  composed,  and  is  not  perfect  until  we 
come  to  the  point  at  which  it  loses  its  name  and  nature 
in  the  complete  separation  of  individuals.  We  come, 
then,  to  the  conclusion  that  each  convict  is  to  be  sepa 
rated  from  his  fellows."  (Page  309.) 


PRISON  E  CONOMY.  1 69 

But  even  Mr.  Livingston  seems  elsewhere  to  modify 
this  absolute  rejection  of  the  principle  of  classification, 
and  to  admit  the  association  of  prisoners  with  very 
cautious  provisions.  4We  have  already  seen  that  he 
proposes  classes  of  not  more  than  ten  for  working  and 
receiving  instruction  together.  Again  he  says: — "  I  dis 
card  the  use  of  the  lash,  therefore,  being  firmly  con 
vinced  that,  as  an  instrument  of  punishment,  it  is  not 
only  defective  and  dangerous,  but  that  it  cannot  be 
brought  to  produce  that  reformation  which  is  one  of 
the  essential  parts  of  my  plan.  But  social  labor, 
whether  general  or  in  classes, — if  these  classes  are  at  all 
numerous  \i.  e.,  if  each  is  numerous  in  individuals], — 
cannot  be  carried  on  without  it,  unless  the  security 
and  order  of  the  prison  be  put  to  hazard.  Social  labor, 
therefore,  must  be  abandoned,  or  so  modified  and  ad 
mitted  with  sitch  precautions  as  to  render  this  anomaly 
[the  use  of  the  lash]  unnecessary."  (Page  334.) 

That  these  modifications  and  precautions  can  be  in 
troduced  has  been  demonstrated  by  successfel  experi 
ment.  The  importance  of  the  end  to  be  attained  by 
adopting  them,  and  of  adopting  them  in  order  to  attain 
that  end,  can  scarcely  be  over-estimated.  The  difficul 
ties  and  the  cost  may  be  great,  but  success  will  abund 
antly  repay  the  expenditure.  Those  who  have  tried 
the  experiment  also  triumphantly  defend  their  plan, 
even  on  general  and  theoretic  grounds. 

It  must  be  plain,  on  a  little  reflection,  that  the  oppo 
site  plan  necessarily  leads  to  absolutely  "  separate  "  or 
solitary  confinement  or  segregation,  through  the  whole 
term  of  imprisonment;  for  the  other  alternative — the 
indiscriminate  association  of  the  prisoners  for  all  or 


I  70  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

any  of  the  time,  is  out  of  the  question.  Such  a  plan, 
therefore,  is  inconsistent  with  the  non-application  of  such 
confinement  to  less  gross  offenders,  or  to  those  sen 
tenced  to  shorter  periods  of  incarceration,  as  in  houses 
of  correction  or  workhouses,  or  even  to  juvenile  con 
victs,  provided  the  idea  of  reformation  in  those  cases 
of  greater  criminality  is  admitted  at  all,  for,  if  these 
last  are  ever  reformed,  they  must  reach  reformation 
gradually,  and  must,  therefore,  before  it  is  complete, 
reach  stages  of  advancement  in  which  they  can  be 
trusted  with  mutual  companionship,  as  well  as  those 
whose  original  criminality  was  less. 

But  if  criminals — even  the  grossest  offenders,  the 
most  corrupt  and  desperate — are  to  be  reformed  and 
discharged  at  all,  they  must  be  so  reformed  as  to  be 
prepared  to  live,  and  to  live  safely,  in  society.  They 
must  be  fitted  for  society,  its  motives,  its  processes,  its 
trials,  and  its  temptations.  Can  they  be  so  fitted 
wholly  outside  of  these  tentative  and  experimental 
influences  ?  Certainly  solitary  or  separate  confine 
ment  should  have  its  place  at  the  beginning,  and  as 
much  of  it  as  is  thought  necessary  in  each  case.  It  is 
invaluable  to  secure  a  period  for  serious  reflection  and 
quiet  instruction,  and  for  preparing  the  prisoner  to 
accept,  with  further  instruction,  society  and  even  labor 
and  all  reformatory  agencies,  as  great  benefits  and 
privileges.  It  may  also  have  an  appropriate  use  for 
temporary  punishment  afterwards,  instead  of  resorting 
to  the  lash,  or  other  degrading  or  violent  remedies. 
If,  by  itself,  it  really  succeeds  in  reforming  the  crimi 
nal,  so  as  to  be  prepared  for  his  full  discharge  at  once 
into  society  at  large,  he  will  certainly  be  prepared,  with 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  171 

entire  safety  to  himself  and  others,  to  be  transferred 
to  the  system  of  social  discipline  here  suggested.  If 
he  leaves  the  solitary  cell  with  good  resolutions,  in 
deed,  but  with  resolutions  not  sufficiently  strengthened 
by  practical  trial,  that  system  will  need  to  be  added  to 
to  confirm  and  complete  the  work  already  begun.  In 
any  event,  the  social  system  is  important  to  be  applied 
as  a  test,  before  the  hopefully-reformed  convict  receives 
his  full  discharge. 

It  will  be  understood,  as  a  matter  of  course,  that  the 
classification  here  recommended  must  not  be  made  on 
an  arbitrary  basis,  as  of  age,  length  of  the  term  of  im 
prisonment  or  portion  of  that  term  elapsed,  supposed 
criminality,  identity,  or  similarity  of  temperament,  or 
the  like. 

"  Like  all  other  exercises  of  mere  authority,  authori 
tative  classification  will  prove  a  pure  delusion  ;  and  in 
fact  very  few  practical  men,  even  now,  are  not  ready 
to  pronounce  it  such.  There  is  no  rule  by  which  to 
regulate  it.  If  by  offense,  this  is  the  mere  accident  of 
conviction  ;  if  by  age,  the  youngest  criminals,  born  and 
cradled  in  sin,  are  very  often  the  most  corrupt ;  if  by 
supposed  similarity  of  temper  or  antecedent  character, 
no  one  can  certainly  pronounce  on  this,  and  men  are 
as  often  and  oftener  improved  by  associating  with  their 
opposites  as  with  those  who  resemble  them.  It  is  im 
possible  to  attain  real  benefit  by  such  means.  One 
general  difference  between  prisoners  at  the  same  time 
does  exist,  which  it  will  be  important,  on  many  occa 
sions,  to  keep  in  view,  but  not  with  the  aim  of  sepa 
rating  them  ;  it  is  this  : — The  difference  between  men 
who  have  erred  from  having  more  than  an  average 


I  7  2  PRISON  E CONOMY. 

amount  of  physical  energy,  and  men  who  have  sinned 
from  having  less  than  an  average  of  moral  principle. 
The  treatment  of  the  two  should  very  considerably  dif 
fer,  and  it  might  not  be  impossible  or  unwise  to  subject 
this  to  regulation."  The  classification,  which  alone  this 
writer  approves,  is  based  on  character,  conduct,  and 
merit,  as  shown  in  the  daily  routine  of  prison  life. 

Such  a  classification  undoubtedly  requires,  on  the 
part  of  the  prison  managers  and  keepers,  a  great  share 
of  knowledge  of  human  nature,  of  good  judgment  and 
sound  discretion,  a  habit  of  close  observation  and  con 
stant  watchfulness,  patient  and  indefatigable  effort,  and  a 
deep,  whole-souled,  devoted  interest  in  the  work  in  hand. 

The  hypocrisy  of  criminals  is  proverbial,  and  must 
be  carefully  guarded  against.  Meanwhile  this  social 
system  is  one  of  the  best  tests  that  can  be  applied  to 
the  evil,  and,  if  the  evil  exists,  will  infallibly  lead  to  its 
seasonable  exposure. 

To  render  this  scheme  of  classification  systematic, 
self-working,  and  not  merely  discretionary  or  perhaps 
capricious,  the  "  mark  system,"  as  it  has  been  called, 
may  be  made  an  important  accessory.  The  working 
and  character  of  this  system  will  be  more  fully  con 
sidered  further  on. 

But.  with  the  exercise  of  all  possible  discretion  and  de 
votion,  and  with  the  use  of  all  possible  helps,  it  must  be 
expected  that  mistakes  will  sometimes  be  made  ;  it  will 
sometimes  be  necessary  to  retrace  steps  that  have  been 
taken,  and  even  ultimate  failure  will  sometimes  ensue. 
But  these  means  will  accomplish  what  can  be  accom 
plished;  they  will  accomplish  much;  and  we  have  no  right 
to  rest  satisfied  until  these  have  been  tried  to  the  fullest 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  173 

possible  extent.  The  experiment  has  been  made  by  Cap 
tain  Maconochie,  to  whose  suggestions  we  have  already 
referred,  and  by  others;  and  wherever  it  has  been  fairly 
and  faithfully  tried,  it  has  proved  eminently  successful. 

VI.    SELECTION    AND    TRAINING    OF    PRISON-KEEPERS. 

Nothing  is  so  important  in  prison  economy  as  the 
right  spirit  and  style  of  administration  ;  to  it  every 
thing  else  is  subordinate ;  without  it  everything  else  is 
unavailing, — whether  structure  of  prisons,  structure  or 
arrangement  of  cells,  ventilation,  diet,  labor,  instruc 
tion,  separate  system,  or  whatever  else, — all  may  be 
spoiled  by  a  wrong  method  of  treatment.  Everything, 
therefore,  hinges  upon  the  character  of  the  wardens  or 
keepers. 

It  may  be  thought  an  insuperable  objection  to  the 
plan  thus  far  developed,  that  the  qualifications  indicated 
as  requisite  in  these  functionaries  are  quite  extraordi 
nary  and  exceptional ;  in  short,  that  enough  of  such 
men  cannot  be  had.  It  may  be  said  that  a  Macono 
chie,  a  Montesinos,  a  Crofton,  or  a  Pilsbury  may  indeed 
accomplish  wonderful  effects  in  the  way  of  reforming 
criminals,  or  rendering  them  orderly  or  industrious,  by 
personal  and  moral  influences,  but  that  it  is  a  mere 
Utopia  to  think  that  such  a  plan  can  be  carried  out  as 
a  general  system.  The  genius,  the  magnetic  power, 
the  extraordinary  personal  qualities  cannot  be  made  to 
order,  or  collected  in  sufficient  quantities  to  meet  the 
demand.  This  may  be  said,  plausibly  said,  and  so  men 
may  turn  away  quite  self-satisfied,  as  if  the  whole  ques 
tion  had  thus  been  settled  and  foreclosed,  and  prison 


174  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

discipline  must  be  left  to  go  on  in  the  future  substan 
tially  as  it  has  gone  on  in  the  past.  "  The  whole  plan 
is  a  mere  theory — a  philanthropic  dream,"  was  the  first 
cry.  It  was  thereupon  put  to  the  test  of  experiment, 
and  succeeded,  and  then  we  are  told — "  ah,  but  the 
men  who  tried  it  were  extraordinary  men,  and  one 
swallow  does  not  make  a  summer."  Let  the  experi 
ment,  we  reply,  be  faithfully  and  earnestly  continued ; 
let  the  attempt  be  made  to  find  more  such  men  ;  let 
this  too  be  tested  by  trial,  and  they  will  be  found. 
What  man  has  done,  man  can  do  ;  and  where  there's 
a  will  there's  a  way.  These  are  the  true  mottoes  for 
all  good  undertakings. 

What  we  have  to  do  is,  first,  to  make  up  our  minds 
what  are  the  proper  qualifications  for  the  keepers  and 
managers  of  prisons,  what  are  the  qualifications  which 
the  public  service  and  the  highest  ends  of  prison  econo 
my  require,  and  then  with  that  degree  of  earnestness 
and  diligence  which  the  case  demands  to  proceed  to 
find  and  judiciously  select  those  who  approach  nearest 
to  the  standard.  Perfection,  of  course,  is  not  to  be 
attained,  and,  therefore,  should  neither  be  demanded 
nor  expected.  But  surely  it  does  not  follow  from  this 
that  it  is  reasonable  to  proceed  without  any  standard 
or  system,  at  pure  hap-hazard,  and  with  no  effort  at 
discrimination,  flattering  ourselves,  and  endeavoring 
to  persuade  the  community,  that  such  are  the  difficulties 
of  the  case  we  and  they  must  be  content  with  what 
ever  material  may  chance  to  fall  in  our  way. 

In  making  the  selection  there  is  one  point  which 
must  be  laid  down  as  absolutely  essential ;  no  political 
influence  must  be  allowed  to  sway  or  interfere  in  the 


PRISON  E  CONOMY.  1 7  5 

slightest  degree  to  impede  or  determine  the  choice.  It 
should  be  a  matter  of  religion  with  all  parties  to  exclude 
such  influence  altogether  from  the  case.  Political  con 
siderations  have  no  more  proper  bearing  upon  this 
function  than  they  have  upon  that  of  a  professor  of 
mathematics.  Moreover,  no  men  who  have  been 
elected  or  appointed  for  quite  different  functions  should 
be  suffered  ex  officio  to  be  employed  in  this.  County 
sheriffs,  for  example,  are  no  more  likely  to  be  fitted 
for  this  office,  or  for  determining  who  possess  the 
proper  qualifications  for  it,  and,  perhaps,  on  the  whole, 
are  less  likely  to  be  so  fitted,  than  the  general  aver 
age  of  intelligent  men.  And  yet  the  sheriffs  of  the 
several  counties  have,  by  law,  the  exclusive  control 
of  almost  all  the  county  jails  or  prisons,  holding  in 
their  hands  the  appointment  of  all  the  keepers  and 
under  officers,  which  appointments  they  have  the 
opportunity,  and  are  under  the  temptation,  to  dis 
tribute  to  themselves  or  their  friends,  as  petty  political 
prizes,  or  as  a  matter  of  private  and  family  patronage. 
While  such  a  system  is  allowed  to  continue,  what  right 
have  we  to  expect  that  the  keepers  of  such  prisons 
should  have  the  spirit  of  a  Howard,  or  emulate  the 
example  or  exhibit  the  tact  and  talent  of  a  Pilsbury 
or  a  Crofton  ?  If  we  cannot  expect  this,  is  it  because 
of  the  inherent  difficulty  of  the  case,  or  because  of 
the  egregious  and  stupendous  folly  of  the  method  we 
persist  in  applying  to  it  ? 

This  is  a  special  function  and  requires  special  apti 
tudes  of  mind  and  qualities  of  character  ;  and  if  enough 
men  fitted  for  it  by  nature,  or  by  their  own  efforts 
and  experience,  cannot  be  found,  provision  should  be 
made  for  the  special  training  of  others. 


176  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

Considering  the  direct  and  important  bearing  of  this 
business  upon  the  public  weal,  what  good  reason  can 
be  given  why  men  should  not  be  especially  trained  for 
this  function,  in  a  sort  of  normal  institute,  as  well  as  for 
the  function  of  school  teachers?  Indeed,  as  there  is  a 
best  way  of  managing  prisons  and  prisoners,  and  as  it 
is  not  only  a  peculiar,  but  a  very  complex  and  intricate 
business,  involving  most  important  principles  of  mental 
and  moral  philosophy,  as  well  as  infinite  practical  de 
tails,  it  is  a  serious  question  whether  any  one  should 
undertake  so  delicate  and  responsible  a  task  without 
a  special  training  for  it.  The  distinguished  warden  of 
the  Albany  Penitentiary,  to  whom  allusion  has  several 
times  been  already  made,  undoubtedly  owes  much  of 
his  remarkable  power  of  efficiently  working  a  prison— 
and  that  in  spite  of  grave  defects  of  general  principles 
in  his  system — to  the  training  he  received  from  his 
father  and  to  his  own  life-long  experience.  Mr.  Pils- 
bury  and  other  men  of  similar  ability  and  knowledge 
of  their  profession  could  in  no  way  turn  their  powers 
and  acquirements  to  better  account  or  make  them  in  a 
higher  degree  subservient  to  the  public  good  than  by 
training  and  instructing  others  who  may  succeed  them 
in  the  exercise  of  their  art,  and  thus  bequeathing  to 
posterity  the  secret  they  have  mastered.  And  by 
concentrating  upon  such  an  institution  the  reflection, 
experience,  and  wisdom  of  the  country  in  this  depart 
ment,  further  secrets  would  be  discovered  and  the  art 
would  be  developed  as  well  as  propagated.  We  ven 
ture  to  recommend  the  establishment  of  such  a  school 
by  State  authority,  with  such  a  system  of  regulations 
in  regard  to  examinations,  to  the  choice  of  prison 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  177 

wardens  and  keepers  and  to1  their  systematic  promo 
tion,  upon  experience,  from  lower  to  higher  grades  and 
from  less  to  more  responsible  positions,  as  will  speedily 
secure  the  enjoyment  of  its  benefits  to  all  the  jails  and 
penitentiaries  in  the  Commonwealth. 

The  dismissal  of  prison-keepers  should  not  be  left  to 
be  determined  solely  upon  specific  charges  of  miscon 
duct  or  ill-treatment,  good  reasons  though  these  are ; 
but  the  proportion  of  the  convicts  discharged  from  the 
care  of  each,  who  should  prove  to  be  reformed  or 
otherwise,  or  who  should  be  re-convicted  for  crime, 
should  be  ascertained  by  careful  statistics ;  and,  the 
cases  having  been  carefully  considered,  in  connection 
with  all  the  circumstances,  incompetent  or  unsuccessful 
keepers  should  he  forthwith  dismissed. 

There  is  one  object  of  the  highest  moment,  to  facili 
tate  the  accomplishment  of  which  the  training-school 
would  most  powerfully  contribute,  and  that  is  the  ele 
vation  of  the  position  of  prison-keepers  in  the  social 
scale  and  in  the  public  regard.  This  profession  should 
be  as  honorable,  and  should  be  made  to  be  held  as  re 
spectable,  in  general  esteem,  as  that  of  school  teachers 
or  college  professors,  or  superintendents  of  asylums 
for  the  insane  or  the  blind.  In  the  nature  of  the  case, 
there  is  no  reason  why  it  should  not  be  so.  The  reason 
why  it  is  not  so  regarded  is  twofold :  first,  the  want  of 
training  and  culture  and  high  character  in  so  many  who 
exercise  the  profession,  the  prevalent  notion  that  men 
of  mere  ordinary  or  inferior  abilities  and  qualities  are 
quite  equal  to  this  work  ;  but  secondly  and  chiefly,  it 
is  because  the  business  of  a  prison-keeper  is  supposed 
to  be,  and,  hitherto,  to  a  large  extent,  has  been,  merely 


I  78  PRISON  E  CONOMY. 

to  secure  and  superintend  the  infliction  of  punish 
ment — an  office  of  unfeeling  coldness  and  sternness, 
of  heartlessness  and  cruelty ;  an  office  calling  for  no 
exercise  of  the  higher  and  kindlier  human  affections, 
but  rather  requiring  their  repression.  Such  an  office 
cannot  command  the  sympathy  or  respect  of  mankind. 
It  is  not  in  human  nature  to  look  upon  it  otherwise 
than  with  repugnance  and  a  recoil  of  disgust, — the 
human  heart  can  apprehend  no  elements  of  honor  in 
it.  Let  us  recognize  and  weigh  well  this  verdict  of 
humanity.  Let  us  be  thankful  that,  though  led  astray 
by  the  principles  of  a  mistaken  policy,  our  prison  econ 
omy  is  sunk  so  low,  yet  our  common  human  nature  is 
not  sunk  so  low  with  it  as  to  regard  it  with  compla 
cency  or  reverence  it  with  honor,  but  instinctively 
repudiates  it  with  a  sense  of  loathing. 

But  let  our  prisons  be  made  and  looked  upon  as 
schools  for  reformation  rather  than  dungeons  of  pun 
ishment,  as  institutions  for  raising  the  fallen  victims  of 
vice,  instead  of  crushing  and  trampling  them  deeper 
into  the  earth ;  and  let  the  managers  and  governors  of 
such  penitentiaries  receive  a  thorough  culture  and  train 
ing  for  such  an  office,  and  they  will  soon  come  to  be 
regarded  as  one  of  the  most  unselfish,  high-minded, 
honorable,  and  elevated  classes  of  human  society.  So 
ought  they  to  be  regarded. 

VII.  COMMUTATION,  OR  THE  SUBSTITUTION  OF  REFORMA 
TION  FOR  LAPSE  OF  TIME,  AS  THE  CONDITION  OF  DIS 
CHARGE. 

All  the  punishments  of  criminal  jurisprudence  being 
imposed  for  the  good  of  society,  within  the  limits  of 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  I  79 

justice  and  under  the  guidance  of  humanity, — as  we 
trust  has  already  been  shown, — reformation  must  be 
included  among  the  ends  of  punishment,  and,  moreover, 
its  inclusion  must  be  an  important  condition  of  the 
right  and  complete  accomplishment  of  any  other  proper 
ends.  It  must,  therefore,  be  the  highest  end  of  all.  It 
is  not  denied  that  punishment  should  have  reference  to 
the  past ;  but  we  have  no  right  to  punish  our  fellow- 
men  for  the  past  in  utter  and  heartless  neglect  of  their 
future.  It  is  not  denied  that  punishment  should  be 
inflicted  as  a  vindication  of  justice  and  a  deterring  ex 
ample  to  others  ;  but  it  will  accomplish  these  purposes 
only — or,  at  least,  thoroughly  accomplish  them  only — 
on  condition  of  its  having  a  reformatory  character. 

If,  then,  punishment  looks  to  the  future  rather  than 
the  past ;  if  the  imprisonment  of  criminals  is  for  the 
protection  of  society  rather  than  for  vengeance  upon 
them,  it  follows  that  the  mere  lapse  of  time  is  no  proper 
measure  for  prospectively  determining  the  length  of  its 
continuance.  Until  the  reformation  aimed  at  is  accom 
plished,  the  same  reason  exists  for  the  continuance  of 
the  detention  which  existed  for  its  beginning.  If 
society  is  to  be  protected  from  the  further  crimes  of 
the  particular  offender,  and  his  imprisonment  was 
mainly  intended  to  secure  that  protection,  what  is  it 
short  of  folly  to  dismiss  him  from  that  imprisonment 
while  he  is  as  ready  and  able  to  assume  and  pursue 
his  career  of  violence  or  depredation  as  when  he  was 
first  incarcerated  ?  If,  by  the  example  of  his  punish 
ment,  others  are  to  be  deterred  from  similar,  or  from 
any,  crimes,  how  else  could  this  purpose  be  more 
effectually  accomplished  than  by  their  seeing  that,  if 


1 80  PRISON  E  CO  NO  MY. 

convicted  of  such  crimes,  there  is  no  way  of  their 
escape  from  perpetual  imprisonment,  but  by  giving 
satisfactory  evidence,  through  a  severe  process  of  long 
and  searching  test  and  trial,  of  sincere  and  thorough 
reformation  ?  Surely  nothing  could  be  more  effectual 
than  this ;  but  it  may  be  suggested  that  something 
short  of  this  may  accomplish  something,  or  even  much, 
in  the  same  direction.  But  it  is  doubtful  whether  any 
punishment  of  offenders  can  have  much  effect  in  deter 
ring  others  from  crime,  when  those  offenders  are 
released  more  hardened  and  defiant  than  they  were 
before ;  and  still  more  doubtful  whether  any  punish 
ment  can,  on  the  whole,  diminish  the  general  amount, 
or  check  in  the  community  the  growth,  of  crime,  unless, 
by  that  punishment,  the  offenders  are  absolutely  pre 
vented  from  returning  to  their  old  courses  and  their 
old  associates. 

The  true  plan,  therefore,  would  seem  to  be,  either 
the  imposition  of  much  longer  time-sentences  than  the 
statutes  now  impose,  with  greatly  increased  opportuni 
ties  to  secure  a  commutation;  or,  what  is  more  consis 
tent  in  principle,  the  conditioning  of  every  discharge 
from  prison — at  least  in  cases  of  felony  or  gross 
offenses — simply  and  absolutely  upon  good  conduct 
and  evidence  of  repentance  and  reformation. 

In  determining  the  weight  of  this  evidence,  the 
character  and  history  of  the  parties  previous  to  their 
incarceration  should  be  taken  into  the  account ;  and 
the  estimation  of  good  conduct  should  not  depend 
simply  upon  orderly  behavior,  obedience  to  prison 
regulations,  and  the  punctual  performance  of  imposed 
tasks,  but  much  more  upon  such  habits  of  voluntary 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  l8l 

and  provident  industry,  and  such  constant  faithfulness, 
under  circumstances  of  increasing  exposure  and  temp 
tation,  as  may  guarantee  a  preparation  of  character 
for  the  labors,  burdens,  and  trials  of  free  life  in  actual 
society. 

The  idea  of  reformatory  punishment  is  apt  to  be 
thought  quite  too  mild  and  gentle  for  dealing  with  the 
rough  and  reckless  characters  of  the  mass  of  depraved 
and  hardened  criminals  ;  it  is  apt  to  be  dismissed  with 
a  quiet  sneer  as  an  unstatesmanlike  and  unpractial 
Utopia  of  men,  very  kind  and  humane,  but  very  ignor 
ant  of  human  nature.  It  would  not  be  surprising,  how 
ever,  if  now,  upon  a  full  development  of  the  idea,  its 
opponents  should  entirely  change  their  tune,  and 
charge  it  with  an  excessive  and  intolerable  severity — 
a  severity  quite  inconsistent  with  the  rights  and  privi 
leges  of  the  free  citizens  of  a  free  state. 

We  must  defend  it,  therefore,  against  this  other 
charge ;  and  we  say  that  such  severity  is  just  that 
which  offends  against  no  principle  of  justice,  humanity, 
charity,  or  religion  ;  and  which,  at  the  same  time,  is 
needed  for  the  full  protection  of  society  against  the 
encroachments  of  the  dangerous  classes. 

As  the  population  multiplies  and  cities  are  thronged, 
as  civilization  advances  and  wealth  increases, — and 
poverty,  too, — crime,  unless  checked  by  special  means, 
will  also  increase  in  a  still  greater  ratio ;  roughs  and 
rowdies  and  desperadoes,  gamblers,  swindlers,  and 
knaves,  thieves  and  pickpockets,  garroters  and  robbers, 
murderers  and  assassins,  will  multiply  apace,  until  the 
courts  are  overwhelmed  and  the  prisons  crowded  ;  and 
yet  the  vast  army  is  recruited  and  filled  up  faster  than 


182  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

it  is  depleted  by  all  the  efforts  of  sheriffs,  judges,  and 
juries.  The  continual  passing  of  a  few  through  the 
pains-taking  process  of  arrest,  trial,  and  brief  imprison 
ment,  only  to  return  with  increased  skill  and  malignity 
as  heroic  leaders  to  their  old  associates,  as  instructors 
to  the  host  of  novices  gathered  in  their  absence,  will 
never  remedy  or  remove  the  evil.  It  is  but  the  labor 
of  Sisyphus.  When  one  looks  at  this  immense  and 
swelling  host  of  the  "  dangerous  classes,"  and  considers 
how  capable  they  are,  in  these  days  of  guilds,  brother 
hoods,  and  associations,  of  a  much  more  thoroughly 
organized  combination  than  they  have  yet  betrayed, 
one  trembles  for  the  future  of  modern  civilization. 
There  are  only  two  remedies  for  the  appalling  evil, 
and  the  second  is  only  supplementary  to  the  first. 
These  are,  first,  the  universal  training  of  the  children 
in  knowledge,  morals,  and  religion,  including,  especi 
ally,  the  outcast,  vagrant,  and  neglected  classes  of 
children  ;  and,  second,  insisting  upon  the  reformation 
of  all  those  who  are  duly  convicted  of  crime  before  they 
are  again  let  loose  upon  the  community.  Both  these 
remedies  are,  in  our  judgment,  imperatively  required 
for  the  public  welfare  and  safety.  And  if  what  the 
public  safety  and  welfare  require  is  ever  to  be  enacted 
into  a  law,  it  would  seem  to  be  when  the  voice,  both 
of  justice  and  humanity,  both  of  rigorous  right  and  of 
gentle  charity,  joins  in  the  requisition. 

Besides  the  common  demand  of  reformation  in  all 
cases,  the  different  degrees  of  criminality  may  need  to 
be  distinguished  by  a  graduation  of  punishment. 

For  this  purpose  there  might  be  imposed,  in  the 
original  sentence,  longer  or  shorter  terms  of  strict 


P£1SOAT  ECONOMY.  183 

solitary  confinement,  or  of  rigorous  hard  labor ;  and  it 
might  be  provided  that,  in  any  event,  the  discharge  of 
the  prisoner  should  not  take  place  before  the  lapse  of 
a  certain  prescribed  period  of  time,  and  this,  especially, 
in  the  case  of  re-convictions. 

Short  terms  of  simple  imprisonment  might  still 
be  imposed,  as  the  whole  punishment,  for  misde 
meanors  and  lesser  offenses,  without  any  violation  of 
the  principle  contended  for,  which  applies  only  to 
crimes  in  the  stricter  sense.  But  persons  so  impris 
oned  should  either  have  a  house  of  detention  entirely 
separate  from  that  of  convict  felons,  or  should  be 
retained  in  solitary  or  separate  confinement  during 
the  whole  period  of  their  punishment. 

There  is  a  class  of  crimes  which  some  may  think  it 
incongruous  to  treat  under  this  idea  of  reformation  as 
an  absolute  condition  of  discharge :  it  is  the  case  of 
those  persons  who  are  guilty  of  acts  of  personal 
violence  in  sudden  brawls  or  intemperate  excitements, 
but  who  do  not  belong  habitually  to  what  are  called  the 
"  dangerous  classes."  But  we  think  their  cases  suffi- 
cently  provided  for  by  the  foregoing  remark,  that,  in 
estimating  the  character  and  standing  of  convicts,  their 
habits  and  history  previous  to  conviction  must  be  duly 
taken  into  account ;  and,  indeed,  the  scheme  of  prison 
discipline  which  is  here  in  view  seems  to  us,  in  this 
connection,  to  have  a  special  advantage,  to  which 
we  cannot  refrain  from  directing  particular  attention. 

Most  of  the  felonious  acts  just  referred  to  are 
occasioned  by  habits  of  ungovernable  passion,  or  of 
intemperance  in  the  use  of  stimulants.  The  temp 
tations  of  this  class  of  persons  are  chiefly  social,  hence 


1 84  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

they  cannot  be  presumed  fit  to  be  intrusted  again 
with  the  control  of  themselves  in  free  society  until 
they  have  stood  the  test  of  some  degree  of  freedom  of 
choice  in  the  companionship  of  their  fellows.  The 
remedy  must  be  social.  Enforced  abstinence,  quiet  re 
flection  in  solitude,  theoretic  instruction,  and  good  reso 
lutions,  with  the  removal  and  absence  of  all  temptation, 
can  hardly  give  sufficient  reason  to  trust  in  the  perma 
nence  of  the  promised  amendment,  when  the  prisoner 
is  suddenly  liberated  from  his  solitary  cell,  and  returns 
to  the  actual  temptations  and  trials  of  social  life. 

The  scheme  suggested  would  require  the  progres 
sive  classification  of  convicts  according  to  their  pro 
gressive  and  various  developments  of  conduct  and 
character — greater  privileges  and  greater  degrees  of 
freedom  being  accorded  in  proportion  to  their  grade 
of  advancement,  and  all  to  be  earned  and  purchased 
by  their  own  efforts.  Such  a  scheme,  of  course,  re 
quires,  in  its  managers,  close  observation  and  a  nice, 
discriminative  judgment.  To  secure  the  fair  and 
proper  working  of  the  scheme,  leaving  as  little  as  pos 
sible  to  arbitrary  determination  and  loose  general 
judgments,  a  complete,  detailed,  and  constant  record 
of  each  prisoner's  conduct  and  character  from  day  to 
day  should  be  made  and  preserved,  to  be  to  the  prison 
manager  what  his  ulog"  is  to  the  mariner.  This  is, 
substantially,  what  is  called  the  "mark  system"  a  full 
description  of  which  is  not  here  required. 

Nor  is  it  essential  that  any  particular,  precisely  pre 
scribed  "  system  "  should  be  adopted.  What  is  essen 
tial,  or,  at  least,  extremely  important,  is,  that  some 
detailed  daily  record  should  be  regularly  kept,  of  every 


Pit  I  SON  ECONOMY.  185 

prisoner's  character  and  conduct,  merits  and  demerits, 
and  of  all  rewards  and  punishments.  There  should  be 
some  system  and  some  definite  record,  for  the  inspection 
of  official  visitors,  for  the  information  and  encourage 
ment  of  the  prisoner,  and  as  a  guide  and  check  for  the 
prison  managers. 

But,  after  all,  a  great  responsibility  must  rest  upon 
these  managers  and  the  inspectors,  and  what  some 
may  think  an  excessive  power  must  be  committed  to 
their  hands — a  power  no  less  than  that  of  practically 
determining,  by  the  recorded  estimates  and  judgments, 
the  term  of  imprisonment  for  every  convict.  Passion 
ate  severities,  favoritism,  and  other  abuses  of  power, 
must  be,  by  law,  guarded  against  in  every  possible 
way.  The  detailed  record  above  mentioned  would  do 
much  as  a  guide  and  as  a  check — a  guide  to  correct 
loose  and  general  impressions ;  a  check  against  sud 
den  and  passionate  judgments.  The  results  in  the  case 
of  discharged  prisoners  would  serve  to  expose  and 
correct  over-laxity ;  and  the  frequent  visits  of  official 
inspectors  would,  with  the  aid  of  the  record  of  marks 
and  the  personal  examination  of  the  prisoners,  be  the 
means  of  detecting  any  undue  severities. 

We  have  only  to  add,  under  this  head,  that  the  prin 
ciple  of  modifying  time-sentences,  by  allowing  the  com 
mutation  here  advocated,  has  been  already  adopted  in 
the  legislation  of  this  Commonwealth. 

The  statute  of  ist  May,  1861,  enacted  that  "every 
prisoner  or  convict,  sentenced  as  aforesaid,  who  shall 
have  no  such  infraction  or  violation  of  the  said  rules 
recorded  against  him  or  her  during  any  month  of  the 
first  year  of  his  or  her  imprisonment,  shall  be  entitled 


1 86  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

to  a  deduction  from  the  term  of  his  or  her  sentence, 
&c.  *  *  Provided,  That  it  shall  be  law 

ful  for  the  inspectors  of  said  penitentiaries  or  prisons, 
if  any  such  convicts  or  persons  shall  willfully  infringe 
or  violate  any  of  said  rules  or  regulations,  or  offend  in 
any  other  way,  to  strike  off  the  whole  or  any  part  of 
the  deduction  which  may  have  been  obtained  previous 
to  the  date  of  such  offense. 

"The  said  inspectors  shall  have  full  power  and 
authority  to  discharge  the  said  criminals,  whenever 
they  have  served  out  their  term  of  sentence,  less  the 
number  of  days  to  which  they  are  entitled  under  the 
provisions  of  this  act." 

And  then  it  is  further  provided  that  a  certificate 
shall  be  given  to  such  discharged  prisoner.  This 
act  applies  alike  to  county  jails  and  State  peniten 
tiaries. 

What  we  ask  is,  that  the  principle  here  involved 
should  have  a  much  wider,  higher,  and  more  consist 
ent  application  ;  that  instead  of  being  the  exception 
it  should  become  the  rule ;  and,  instead  of  the  com 
mutation  being  based  merely  upon  obedient  submission 
to  prison  regulations,  it  should  be  based  upon  industry, 
diligence,  moral  conduct,  and  progress  in  practical  re 
formation.  The  greater  benefits  which  would  then 
ensue  may  be  judged  of  by  the  benefits  which  have 
followed  upon  the  partial  application  of  the  principle. 
In  their  last  report,  the  inspectors  of  the  Philadelphia 
County  Prison  testify  that  "  the  commutation  act,  by 
which  prisoners,  who  conduct  themselves  without  charge 
of  misconduct,  are  entitled  to  a  deduction  in  the  terms 
of  their  sentences,  has  been  in  operation  in  the  prison 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  187 

since  May,  1870.  Its  effect  upon  the  discipline  of  the 
prison  has  been  apparent,  and  we  see  no  reason  to 
doubt  that  its  general  reformatory  influence  has  been 
good." 

VIII.    INTERMEDIATE    PRISONS    OR    DISCHARGING-HOUSES. 

The  reformation  of  criminals  is  the  object  in  view  ; 
and  this  object  is  presumed  to  be  eventually  attained. 
The  process  is  in  its  nature  gradual ;  and  the  course  of 
progressive  classification  adapts  itself  to  the  advance 
ment  from  stage  to  stage,  both  recognizing  and  pro 
moting  it.  But  something  more  distinct  and  decisive 
seems  necessary  to  mark  the  highest  and  final  stage. 
Those  who  have  reached  this  point  are  supposed  to  be 
already  substantially  reformed.  Like  the  piece  of  ord 
nance  before  its  transfer  to  actual  service,  they  need 
only  a  final  testing  to  ascertain  whether  they  will  bear 
the  strain  of  free  society.  They  are  really  in  a  tran 
sition  state,  not  quite  ready  to  be  trusted  with  entire 
freedom,  and  yet  not  to  be  treated  simply  as  convicts. 
It  seems  eminently  proper,  therefore,  that,  at  this  stage, 
they  should  find  themselves  in  a  new  atmosphere,  sur 
rounded  by  new  associations,  under  new  circumstances 
of  recognized  respectability  as  well  as  of  responsibility, 
where  the  character  of  the  man  should  begin  quite  to 
overshadow  and  efface  that  of  the  convict.  For  this 
purpose  new  quarters,  quite  separate  and  distinct,  both 
in  character  and  in  name,  from  those  of  the  less 
advanced  prisoners,  would  be  required.  Such  quar 
ters  we  venture  to  call  "  intermediate  prisons,"  or, 
better,  perhaps,  "discharging-houses."  They  should  be 


1 88  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

regarded  not  so  much  in  the  light  of  prisons  as  of  simple 
reformatories.  In  them  the  idea  of  punishment  should 
give  place  entirely  to  that  hopeful,  voluntary  amend 
ment,  or  confirmation  of  amendment.  Only  in  case  of 
misconduct  the  right  would  remain  to  the  superintend 
ents  or  controlling  managers  of  a  summary  remand 
ing  of  the  offender  to  the  prison  proper. 

As  the  reformation,  so  the  transfer  to  entire  freedom 
would  thus  be  made  by  degrees.  And  this  last  degree 
is  a  most  important  preparation  for  the  full  discharge. 
We  do  not  propose  to  suggest  the  details  of  arrange 
ment  for  these  houses  or  prisons  ;  they  may  be  greatly 
varied,  according  to  circumstances,  and  according  to 
the  personal  judgment  and  peculiar  aptitudes  of  the 
superintendents.  The  general  principles  to  be  carried 
out  should  be  to  give  much  greater  freedom  of  action 
than  in  former  stages, — perhaps  entire  freedom  within 
certain  limits  of  time, — to  manifest  much  greater  per 
sonal  confidence  in  the  men,  retaining  the  feature  of 
mutual  watch  and  responsibility,  and  the  absolute  re 
quirement  upon  all  to  be  at  their  quarters  before  a 
certain  hour  in  the  evening. 

Some  may  think  it  a  crushing  and  final  objection  to 
any  such  scheme  that,  in  their  opinion,  many,  if  not  all, 
the  prisoners  under  such  treatment  would  make  their 
escape  and  disappear.  But  such  an  objection  is  the 
child  of  despair.  It  proceeds  from  an  entire  want  of 
hope  that  criminals  can  ever  be  reformed.  For  only 
those  who  are  presumed  to  be  substantially  reformed — 
whether  under  the  separate  or  the  social  system — are 
to  be  placed  in  these  circumstances  and  allowed  these 
liberties  ;  and,  when  placed  here,  should  they  all  make 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  189 

their  escape,  it  would  be  no  worse  than  if,  instead  of 
being  placed  here,  they  had  all  been  forthwith  dis 
charged.  But  they  will  not  all  escape ;  some  may ;  it 
is  to  be  presumed  that  some  will.  Still,  we  shall  retain 
this  advantage,  that  they  will  be  escaped  prisoners,  and, 
upon  arrest,  can  be  restored  to  their  incarceration 
without  being  arraigned,  tried,  and  convicted  for  some 
new  crime  against  society.  Most  of  such  runaways 
would  be  arrested. 

If  it  be  thought  that,  while  the  fear  of  such  arrest 
and  its  consequences  might  be  a  restraint,  yet  such 
restraint  would,  after  all,  be  a  sort  of  compulsion,  and 
would  not  prepare  for  a  state  of  entire  freedom ;  we 
answer  that  such  an  objection  proceeds  upon  the  idea 
that  nothing  but  entire  freedom  can  prepare  for  entire 
freedom ;  it  rejects  all  approximation,  and  annuls  the 
idea  of  preparation  altogether.  Whereas,  we  believe 
that  self-control,  exercised  under  such  a  motive,  would 
not  only  test  its  own  power,  but  would  confirm  a  habit 
of  self-control,  with  a  view  to  the  future,  which  would 
be  one  of  the  most  powerful  preservatives  from  a  re 
sumption  of  criminal  courses,  after  the  full  discharge 
and  restoration  to  entire  freedom. 

It  may  be  thought  that  this  plan  would  require  a 
multiplication  of  prison  establishments,  and  thus  entail 
upon  the  State  a  great  additional  expenditure.  But, 
even  though  this  were  the  case,  still,  provided  the  plan 
were  liable  to  no  other  valid  objection,  and  provided  it 
would  be  productive  of  the  benefits  proposed,  no  such 
petty  objection  of  expense  should  weigh  for  a  moment 
against  them.  Such  an  outlay  would  be  a  good  invest 
ment.  It  would  go  to  prevent  the  waste  of  much  of 


1 90  PRISON  ECONOMY, 

the  other  expenditure  which  crime  entails  upon  the 
State.  Penuriousness  is  often  the  greatest  extrava 
gance.  But  no  multiplication  of  prisons  need  result, 
even  temporarily,  from  the  plan  proposed,  but  only  a 
special  distribution  of  them  ;  for,  while  we  should  con 
fidently  believe  and  maintain  that,  in  the  long  run,  it 
would  tend  to  diminish  the  number  of  prisoners,  it 
would  not,  even  at  the  first,  necessarily  increase  their 
number ;  for  prisoners  might  naturally  be  transferred 
to  these  intermediate  houses  of  detention  somewhat 
sooner  than,  without  them,  it  would  be  thought  proper 
to  risk  their  complete  discharge. 

As  for  the  current  expenses  of  these  establishments, 
our  idea  is  that — with  the  exception,  of  course,  of  the 
sick  and  the  infirm — all  prisoners,  both  here  and  in  the 
former  stages  of  their  confinement,  but  especially  here, 
should  by  their  own  industry  pay  for  their  main 
tenance. 

Under  a  judicious  management  they  would  not  only 
do  this,  but  would  rapidly  accumulate  their  reserve 
fund,  to  be  received  by  them  upon  their  release.  As 
a  general  rule,  none  would  be  transferred  to  this  inter 
mediate  position  who  should  not  already  have  earned 
and  accumulated  such  a  fund  ;  and  this  fund  being  still 
at  risk,  and  liable  to  be  forfeited  for  misconduct,  would 
be  a  further  pledge  for  good  behavior,  as  well  as  a 
guarantee  for  their  current  expenses.  Here  is  another 
motive  of  restraint  which  some  may  stigmatize  as  of 
the  nature  of  compulsion  ;  but  it  is  the  same  sort  of 
compulsion  as  that  under  which  all  men  are  called 
upon  to  act  in  ordinary  life.  It  is,  therefore,  most  ap 
propriate  as  a  final  preparation  to  return  to  that  life, 
with  its  temptations  and  its  responsibilities. 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  191 

IX.     REFUGES    AND    OTHER    PROVISION    FOR    DISCHARGED 
PRISONERS. 

This  is  an  indispensable  part  of  every  effectual 
scheme  of  prison  economy.  It  is  the  clincher  of  the 
whole.  Without  it  the  rest  of  the  scheme,  however 
perfect  in  itselfj  will  largely  fail  to  accomplish  its  end. 
The  State,  therefore,  cannot  afford  to  leave  this  por 
tion  of  the  process  entirely,  as  is  commonly  proposed 
and  has  hitherto  been  done,  to  the  kindly  but  uncertain 
and  inadequate  efforts  of  private  charity. 

To  cause  the  stream  of  criminal  life  to  circulate 
through  the  penitentiary,  without  change  or  improve 
ment  in  its  character,  must  be  to  small  purpose.  It  is 
only  a  brief  arrest  of  the  current's  rapidity.  It  is  as  a 
dam  thrown  across  a  river ;  the  waters  are  checked 
and  accumulated  for  a  time,  but  in  the  end  just  as 
much  is  discharged  below  as  is  received  from  above. 

And  scarcely  to  any  more  purpose  will  it  be  to 
reform  the  prisoners  before  returning  them  to  society, 
if  upon  being  so  returned  they  are  to  be  treated  as 
outcasts. 

Yet  hitherto  they  have  been  so  treated,  whether 
reformed  or  unreformed.  There  has  prevailed  in  the 
community  an  almost  unconquerable,  and,  as  things 
have  been  managed,  a  not  unnatural  or  unreasonable, 
feeling  of  distrust  and  aversion,  of  shrinking  repug 
nance  and  even  of  fear  and  horror,  towards  discharged 
convicts.  They  have  found  no  sympathy,  no  encour 
agement,  no  helping  hand,  no  shelter,  no  employment, 
no  means  of  honest  subsistence.  Every  man's  hand 
has  been  against  them,  every  back  turned  upon  them, 


PRISON  ECONOMY. 

every  door  shut  in  their  faces  and  barred  against  their 
intrusion.  They  have  been  turned  out  of  prison  into 
a  dark  passage,  walled  up  to  heaven  on  either  side, 
their  only  alternative  either  to  lie  down  in  it  and  perish, 
or  to  follow  it  out  to  its  only  exit  among  their  old 
associates  and  in  their  old  trade. 

Shall  this  continue?  And  what  is  to  be  the  end  of 
these  things  ?  Surely  these  questions  address  them 
selves,  not  merely  to  philanthropic  sentiment,  but  to 
the  coolest  and  most  calculating  regard  for  the  public 
interest.  No  wonder  that  under  the  present  system 
the  proportion  of  re-convictions  should  be  very  large. 
We  know  it  to  be  large  ;  but  it  is  unquestionably  much 
larger  than  can  ever  be  ascertained,  owing  to  the  great 
extent  of  our  territory  and  the  distribution  of  our 
penal  administration  among  so  many  independent 
States. 

With  our  present  prison  management  and  with  the 
circumstances  of  discharged  prisoners  left  as  they  are, 
it  may  be  seriously  questioned  whether  it  is  reasonable 
or  just  to  condemn  re-convicted  criminals,  as  is  so  often 
strenuously  urged,  to  an  aggravated  severity  of  punish 
ment.  The  first  step  in  remedying  the  evil  must  be 
the  full  and  frank  adoption  in  prison  discipline  of  the 
principle  of  reformation,  carried  out  through  the  inter 
mediate  trial  above  recommended  and  supplemented 
by  the  refuges  here  suggested.  Let  this  course  be 
adopted,  and  while,  in  accordance  with  the  very  nature 
of  the  reformatory  plan,  the  re-convicted  criminal  would 
be  placed  under  a  severer  and  more  cautious  course 
of  discipline  and  trial,  it  would  also  be  both  manifestly 
reasonable  and  highly  important  that  the  absolute  or 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  193 

minimum  length  of  his  time-sentence  or  task-sentence 
should  likewise  be  increased. 

While  the  present  plan  and  working  of  prison  dis 
cipline  continues,  it  will  also  continue  impossible  to 
revolutionize  or  greatly  to  modify  the  public  sentiment 
in  regard  to  discharged  convicts,  to  remove  or  sensi 
bly  to  mitigate  the  feeling  of  distrust  and  repugnance 
towards  them.  Nor  if  it  were  possible  would  it  be 
reasonable  to  attempt  it,  for  to  a  very  great  extent  the 
feeling  is  well  founded. 

The  revolution  must  begin  in  the  policy  of  the  state. 
Her  treatment  of  imprisoned  convicts  must  be  changed 
before  the  reception  of  discharged  convicts  on  the  part 
of  the  community  can  be  changed.  Let  it  not  be  sug 
gested  that  this  state  of  degradation,  in  which  released 
convicts  find  themselves  and  this  repulsion  which  they 
meet  with  on  all  sides,  is  their  own  fault,  is  a  natural 
and  proper  part  of  their  punishment.  If  so,  the  state 
ought  to  take  their  lives  or  shut  them  up  in  perpetual 
incarceration.  She  has  no  right  to  turn  them  out  and 
spurn  them  from  her  and  say,  "  Steal  or  die ;  and  it  is 
your  own  fault."  Here  again  the  first  step  for  the 
state  is  the  adoption  of  the  principle  that  reformation 
is  the  great  end  of  the  detention  of  criminals  in  prison. 
If  this  principle  is  once  adopted  and  successfully  car 
ried  out,  it  will  tend  most  powerfully  toward  removing 
the  popular  prejudice  against  discharged  convicts. 

Still,  in  order  to  facilitate  the  healthy  re-absorption 
of  such  convicts  into  the  mass  of  society,  there  would 
remain  for  a  long  time,  and  perhaps  always,  a  necessity, 
or  at  least  important  office,  for  such  establishments  or 
refuges  as  we  here  propose.  It  has  sometimes  been 


194  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

suggested  and  attempted  to  secure  their  re-admission 
to  the  bosom  of  society  by  carefully  concealing  their 
character  as  discharged  convicts.  What  we  propose 
is,  an  open  admission  of  that  character,  by  an  acknowl 
edged  connection  with  a  public  establishment  expressly 
kept  up  for  their  resort.  This  is  the  open  and  honest 
course  of  dealing  with  the  community,  without  subter 
fuge  or  deception.  Discharged  convicts  are  thus  not 
smuggled  into  society  under  a  mask,  or  thrust  in  an 
underhand  way  on  those  who  employ  them.  They  are 
not  called  upon  to  hide  or  deny  the  fact  that  they 
are  discharged  convicts,  while  all  the  time  fully  aware 
that  if  this  fact  were  known  they  would  be  rejected 
and  refused  employment,  thus  beginning  their  new 
lives  with  the  practice  of  a  lesson  in  swindling  and 
falsehood. 

These  refuges  or  establishments  for  the   resort  of 
discharged  prisoners  should  contain  : — 

1.  The  means  of  lodging  and  maintenance  for  such 
numbers  as  would    be  likely  to  resort  to  them,  with 
considerable  elasticity  as  to  enlargement  or  contrac 
tion. 

2.  They  should    be    supplied  with  workshops,    im 
plements,  and  materials  for  the  employment  of  such 
as  should  not  find  opportunity  for  employment  else 
where. 

3.  They  should  be   supplied  with    means    of  good 
advice  and  instruction,  of  mental  and  moral  improve 
ment,  as  reading-rooms,  &c. 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  195 

4.  It  should  be  understood  that  those  who  can  find 
employment  elsewhere  should  have  their  lodging  here 
as  long  as  they  desire  it. 

5.  All  should  be  required  to   pay  for   their  board, 
lodging,  and  other  expenses  by  their  own  earnings  or 
out  of  their  reserve  fund. 

6.  The  reserve  fund,  accumulated  by  each  prisoner 
before  his  release,  should  be  held  on  deposit  at  the 
refuge,  to  be  set  against  his  current  expenses  if  nec 
essary  ;  and  the  whole  to  be  paid  up  to  him,   not  at 
once,  but  in  installments  within  such  time  (whether  he 
remains  in  the  refuge  or  not)  as  may  be  judged  expe 
dient  and  established  by  a  fixed  rule.     Such  arrange 
ments  could  easily  be  made  in  respect  to  the  plan  of 
his    receiving  the   several    installments   as   he   should 
desire  ;  and  such  precautions  could  be  taken  as  should 
be  necessary  to  secure  against  their  undue  or  their 
premature  transfer  to  other  parties,  to  the  prejudice  of 
the  original  claimant. 

7.  Should  the  reserve  fund,  in  any  case,  be  exhausted, 
and  the  man  seek  to  remain  an  idle  hanger-on  at  the 
refuge,  it  would  simply  be  proved  that  the  reformatory 
discipline  had,  in  his  case,  failed  of  the  hoped-for  effect. 
Such  instances    might  of  course  occur.     It  would  not 
be  very  difficult  to  devise  the  proper  means  of  dealing 
with  them  ;  and  we  are  quite  confident  that  they  would 
be  but  few.     But  we  shall  pursue  them  no  further. 

We  have  merely  to  add  that  the  suggestions  here 
made  have  in  some  form  or  other  received  the  support 


196  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

of  almost  every  writer  on  prison  economy  in  the  pres 
ent  century,  their  voices  only  increasing-  in  earnestness 
as  the  years  roll  on.  Indeed,  it  may  justly  be  claimed 
that  the  general  consent  of  all  experienced  and  thought 
ful  men  for  the  last  ten  or  fifteen  years  has  been  pitched 
in  one  key — "  longer  sentences,  steadier  discipline,  re 
wards  for  good  conduct,  and  assistance  to  discharged 
prisoners." 

X.    THE    PARDONING    POWER. 

There  can  be  no  doubt  that  this  power  has  some 
times  been  grossly  abused.  And  this  abuse  has  been 
fruitful  of  some  of  the  greatest  evils  that  beset  the 
economy  of  penal  jurisprudence.  Men  have  been 
pardoned,  because  they  had  influential  friends,  or  from 
mere  caprice.  Men  have  been  pardoned  in  view  of 
private  and  personal,  and  not  of  general  and  public, 
considerations.  Men  have  been  pardoned,  and  that  by 
no  means  unfrequently,  who  have  soon  found  their 
way  back  to  prison  again ;  and  sometimes  these  same 
men  have  been  pardoned  out  a  second  time.  Men 
have  been  pardoned  without  any  proper  evidence 
either  of  innocence,  or  of  any  mitigation  of  crimi 
nality,  or  of  reformation.  Men  have  been  pardoned,  if 
not  from  corrupt,  yet  from  altogether  improper  and  in 
sufficient  motives.  In  short,  men  have  been  pardoned 
in  such  numbers,  and  with  such  entire  disregard  of 
fixed  principles,  as  to  encourage  the  commission  of 
crime,  breaking  down  the  certainty  of  punishment  even 
after  conviction,  and  opening  to  the  most  abandoned 
criminals,  when  receiving  their  sentence,  a  door  of  hope, 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  197 

that  very  likely,  after  all,  they  will  not  be  obliged  to 
serve  it  out. 

Still,  the  pardoning  power  must  be  retained  ;  it  must 
be  lodged  somewhere  ;  it  cannot  be  dispensed  with. 
There  may  be  cases  of  persons  who,  after  having  been 
sentenced  and  committed  to  prison,  are  found  to  have 
been  convicted  on  false  testimony  or  by  some  mistake  ; 
others  in  whose  cases  circumstances  greatly  miti 
gating  their  offense  are  subsequently  discovered ; 
others  whose  enlargement  may  be  required  for  the 
ends  of  public  justice,  as  that  they  may  be  qualified 
to  testify  as  witnesses ;  and  others,  whose  offenses 
having  been  committed  in  some  scene  or  occasion  of 
great  public  or  political  excitement,  their  release  is 
afterwards  demanded,  before  the  expiration  of  their 
sentence,  by  considerations  of  state  policy  and  expe 
diency  ;  and  so  on. 

What  is  needed,  therefore,  is  not  that  the  pardoning 
power  should  be  abolished,  but  that,  in  the  first  place, 
it  should  be  hedged  about  as  far  as  possible  by  consti 
tutional  limitations  ;  and,  for  the  rest,  it  should  be  held 
in  constant  check  by  an  awakened  and  watchful  public 
sentiment.  This  is  needed  as  a  safeguard  against  the 
abuse  of  all  discretionary  and  irresponsible  power;  and 
too  much  cannot  be  said  and  done  to  keep  such  a  sen 
timent  always  alive  and  in  vigorous  exercise. 

But  we  dismiss  this  point  with  these  brief  remarks, 
not  because  it  is  unimportant  or  irrelevant  to  our  gen 
eral  subject,  but  because,  not  being  a  matter  of  legis 
lation,  it  is,  strictly  speaking,  aside  from  our  proper 
office. 


198  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

XI.    IMPRISONMENT    FOR    LIFE. 

It  is  difficult  to  conceive  of  a  case  of  crime  in  which 
imprisonment  for  life  would  be  an  expedient  or  appro 
priate  punishment.  This  judgment  may  seem  strange 
or  paradoxical ;  but  we  believe  that  the  grounds  upon 
which  it  is  founded  are  entirely  tenable. 

Imprisonment  for  life  as  a  constant  substitute  for 
capital  punishment  is  scarcely  defensible,  for  if  rigor 
ously  carried  out  it  involves  unnecessary  lingering 
cruelty,  and  at  the  same  time  has  not  the  deterring 
power  which  belongs  to  the  dread  penalty  of  death. 
It  is  really  killing  by  degrees,  while  it  seems  not  to 
kill  at  all,  and  so  far  as  the  punishment  is  to  operate 
upon  others,  the  seeming  is  of  more  consequence  than 
the  reality.  It  is  a  protracted  execution,  yet  so  pro 
tracted  that  the  terrible  impression,  for  want  of  con 
centration,  is  dissipated.  On  the  other  hand,  if  not 
rigorously  carried  out — always  rigorously  carried  out, 
it  is  plainly,  as  regards  its  exemplary  influence,  a  still 
more  perfect  failure;  and  it  will  not  be  rigorously  car 
ried  out  unless  death,  before  the  lapse  of  many  years, 
should  intervene  to  cut  short  its  duration.*  One  gene 
ration  will  not  consent  to  be  the  executioners  or  jailors 
for  another.  The  convict  whose  crimes  have  faded 
from  recollection  will  be  pardoned  and  released. 

Such  imprisonment,  as  an  occasional  substitute  for 
capital  punishment,  is  still  more  awkward;  for  if  capital 
punishment  should  ever  be  inflicted,  its  infliction  is  ap 
parently  required  in  those  cases  of  crime  in  which  it 

*  We  believe  that  the  average  term  of  imprisonment  for  "  life  sentences  "  is 
about  ten  years. 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  199 

is  judged  absolutely  unsafe  for  the  guilty  man  ever 
again  to  live  at  large  in  human  society. 

Looking  at  the  subject,  in  the  next  place,  in  relation, 
not  to  the  direct  external  effect,  but  to  its  bearing  upon 
the  convict  himself,  and  upon  the  good  of  society  as 
indirectly  involved  in  his  good,  imprisonment  for  life 
must  be  condemned  on  other  grounds. 

It  is  utterly  and  manifestly  inconsistent  with  the  idea 
of  reformation  as  the  object  of  penal  detention.  It 
cuts  off  at  once  all  hope,  all  stimulus  to  effort,  all  mo 
tive  for  self-denial  or  self-control. 

If  the  hopes  of  a  future  life  are  suggested,  how 
weak  must  be  their  influence ;  how  dim  and  distant 
their  view,  unsupported  by  nearer  and  lower  motives, 
under  circumstances  of  aggravated  temptation,  and 
especially  with  a  sense  that  there  is  time  enough  yet, 
and  more  than  enough;  that  time,  indeed,  is  the  great 
est  burden,  and  that  the  principal  object  is  to  find  out 
how  to  kill  it  as  fast  and  effectually  as  possible ;  and 
how  inconsistent  to  urge  a  man,  in  the  name  of  the 
state,  to  be  good,  and  at  the  same  time  to  tell  him  that, 
even  if  he  should  become  a  saint,  you  will  still  treat 
him  as  a  scoundrel  as  long  as  he  lives. 

If  the  hope  of  a  discharge  at  last,  through  executive 
clemency,  is  suggested,  this  removes  the  idea  of 
reformation  still  farther  from  the  prisoner's  mind,  and, 
besides,  annuls  the  very  fact  of  imprisonment  for  life, 
and,  of  course,  all  the  influence  that  the  anticipation  of 
such  a  fact  could  have  upon  the  prisoner's  mind,  or 
upon  the  minds  of  others. 

If,  finally,  the  hope  is  suggested  of  a  discharge  in 
case  of  manifest  reformation,  this,  to  have  its  full  effect, 


200  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

or  to  be  at  all  reasonable,  must  not  be  uncertain  or 
capricious — a  mere  may  be — but  must  be  on  system 
and  by  fixed  rules  ;  and  if  so,  then  it  is  manifest  that 
the  imprisonment  has  ceased,  even  in  theory,  to  be  for 
life  ;  it  is  placed  upon  a  new  principle  ;  it  is  simply 
imprisonment  terminable  upon  reformation,  and  upon 
reformation  only.  As  such,  we  have  not  a  word  to 
say  against  it.  It  is  precisely  the  kind  of  imprison 
ment  whose  systematic  adoption  we  have  ventured  to 
suggest  as  the  best  of  all  remedies  for  crime. 

XII.    COUNTY  JAILS   AND   MUNICIPAL   PRISONS  AND   STATION- 
HOUSES. 

We  here  touch  upon  one  of  the  most  important,  be 
cause  among  us  the  most  neglected,  departments  of 
prison  economy.  Our  State  prisons  or  penitentiaries, 
and  a  few  of  the  principal  county  prisons,  which,  from 
their  connection  with  large  cities,  belong,  in  a  manner, 
to  the  same  class,  have  attracted  and  absorbed  almost 
the  whole  attention  of  those  who  have  interested  them 
selves  in  the  improvement  of  prison  discipline.  Upon 
what  has  been  done  in  these  have  been  exclusively 
based  our  too-confident  boasts  and  over-weening  self- 
satisfaction  in  view  of  the  supposed  vast  progress  by 
which  we  have  flattered  ourselves  with  having  out 
stripped  the  rest  of  the  world.  In  them  some  progress 
has  unquestionably  been  made.  They  have  been  bet 
ter  constructed.  Their  management  has  been  raised 

o 

to  a  much  higher  standard.  Their  wardens  and  keep 
ers  are  generally  most  respectable,  zealous,  and  intelli 
gent  men.  They  are  visited,  watched  over,  and 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  2O1 

managed  by  faithful  and  judicious  inspectors.  They 
are  kept  before  the  eye  of  the  public,  which  takes  in 
them  a  lively  interest.  Much  earnest  effort  is  made— 
though  not  always  successfully — to  preserve  them  from 
confusion,  over-crowding,  negligence,  and  abuse.  In 
short,  the  system  which  they  have  adopted,  such  as  it  is, 
is  worked  with  most  commendable  fidelity  and  large 
efficiency. 

When  we  turn  from  these  and  look  at  the  average 
of  county  jails  and  city  lock-ups,  the  scene  changes. 
Here  the  grossest  abuses  keep  uninterrupted  carnival. 
Bad  construction,  bad  ventilation,  bad  management, 
reckless  treatment,  indiscriminate  mingling  of  prison 
ers, — with  no  separation  at  all,  except  that  of  the  sexes, 
and  not  always  even  that, — intolerable  crowding  of 
cells,  no  kindly  sympathy,  no  moral  or  religious  in 
struction  or  influence,  disregard  of  health  and  cleanli 
ness,  no  provision  or  opportunity  for  labor, — in  plain 
violation  of  the  statute, — the  practice  of  all  sorts  of 
petty  tyranny,  these  are  their  characteristics ;  and  the 
people  love  to  have  them  so,  or  pass  by  them  on  the 
other  side,  or  look  upon  them  as  places  too  low,  rough, 
and  foul  to  be  approached  or  meddled  with.  Few 
besides  the  sheriff,  the  policeman,  or  the  alderman — 
and  the  inmates — know  anything  about  their  interior 
condition  or  history ;  and  the  officers,  even  though 
endowed  with  much  natural  goodness  of  heart,  grow  so 
thoroughly  accustomed  to  the  abuses  and  abominations 
that  reign  around  them,  that  they  become  hardened  to 
the  scene,  and  lose  all  idea  of  the  possibility  or  desir 
ableness  of  reform.  And  as  for  the  keepers,  they 
must  often  be  not  much  superior,  either  in  intellectual 


202  PR 1 SON  ECONOMY. 

or  moral  character  or  culture  to  those  who  are  placed 
under  their  care.  Many  of  these  city  establishments, 
if  inspected  at  an  early  morning  hour,  would  suffer  in 
comparison  with  the  prisons  of  Turkey  or  Persia  or 
Hindostan.  Yet  through  them,  as  a  kind  of  heart, 
the  criminal,  the  vagrant,  the  drunken  and  quarrelsome 
part  of  the  population,  is  continually  circulating — fester 
ing  and  fermenting  together.  In  comparison  with  the 
number  of  persons  who  are  annually  locked  up  in  these 
establishments,  and  detained  for  a  longer  or  shorter 
period,  the  number  of  those  sentenced  to  the  State 
penitentiaries  is  as  nothing.  It  is  true  some  of  the 
county  jails  are  not  so  crowded  as  the  city  prisons  and 
lock-ups ;  and  in  general,  the  same  abuses  and  evils 
do  not  exist  to  the  same  extent  in  all  these  institutions 
alike  ;  but  they  exist  to  an  alarming  extent,  and  more 
or  less,  almost  everywhere. 

What  is   absolutely  required   in  all  these  places  of 
detention  is  :— 

1.  Such  an   enlargement  of  the  accommodations— 
at  whatever  cost — as  may  furnish  for  every  inmate  a 
separate,   well-aired,   cleanly,  and  healthy  lodging  for 
the  night,  and  proper  distribution   for  companionship 
by  day  (if  companionship  is  allowed),  with  wholesome 
and  well-served  food;  and, 

2.  Such  a  provision  of  keepers,  of  high,  respectable, 
and  responsible  character,  as  will  insure  the  humane 
and  judicious  treatment  of  the  prisoners. 

But,  in  connection  with  these  jails  and  ward-houses, 
the   greatest  evil  and  most  crying  injustice  of  all   re- 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  203 

mains  to  be  considered.  It  relates  to  the  detention  of 
witnesses,  of  vagrants,  and  of  persons  charged  with 
crime. 

Not  only  are  persons  charged  with  crimes  of  all 
kinds  and  degrees,  in  company  with  idlers,  drunkards, 
vagabonds,  and  rioters,  all  crowded  and  mingled  to 
gether,  for  a  night,  and  sometimes  longer,  in  these 
municipal  Bridewells  ;  but,  in  the  jails,  all  these  are 
thus  huddled  in,  sometimes  for  many  months,  with  per 
sons  detained  as  witnesses  added  to  the  company ;  and 
all,  in  many  cases,  left  in  perfect  idleness,  or  busy  only 
in  deepening  their  own  depravity  or  imbibing  that  of 
others  ;  the  old  adepts  maturing  their  plans  of  crime, 
and  inoculating  all  around  them  with  their  pestilent 
corruption.  If  all  these  were  convicted  felons  to 
gether,  it  would  not  only  be  most  unwise  and  impolitic, 
but  most  inhuman  and  abominable,  to  subject  them  to 
such  a  regimen  ;  but  who  can  express  the  enormity  of  its 
injustice,  as  well  as  its  folly,  when  it  is  added  that  to  it 
are  subjected  persons  acknowledged  to  be  perfectly  in 
nocent,  who  are  detained  by  the  highest  stretch  of  the 
civil  authority,  merely  in  order  to  secure  their  testimony, 
which  is  presumed  important  to  the  ends  of  public  jus 
tice  ;  and  persons  charged  with  crime,  indeed,  but 
either  charged  upon  suspicion,  which  may  prove  most 
foul  and  unfounded,  or  committed  upon  ex  parte  testi 
mony,  which  may  prove  prejudiced  or  malicious  !  The 
witnesses,  we  say,  are  confessedly  innocent,  it  may  be 
virtuous  men,  whose  only  fault  is  that  they  are  poor 
and  friendless,  and  therefore  cannot  furnish  a  satisfac 
tory  guarantee  for  their  appearance  at  the  required 
time.  The  state  may  have  a  right  to  detain  them — 


204  PRISON  ECONOMY, 

she  may  have  a  right  temporarily  to  deprive  them  of 
their  liberty,  as  she  has  a  right  to  take  private  property 
for  the  public  good ;  but  what  right  has  she  to  thrust 
them  in  to  herd  with  vagrants,  thieves,  pickpockets, 
and  murderers,  as  their  associates  day  and  night  ?  If  it 
be  thought  that  as  virtuous  men  they  will  be  in  no 
great  danger  of  being  harmed,  but  may  do  some  good 
in  such  society,  it  must  be  remembered  that  some  of 
them  may  be  young  and  inexperienced,  or  intellectually 
or  morally  weak ;  in  any  event,  that  an  honest  man  or 
woman  must  look  upon  the  imposition  of  such  society 
as  a  gross  and  horrible  infliction  ;  and  that  to  compel 
men  to  be  missionaries  has  never  been  recognized  as 
one  of  the  rights  of  the  state. 

As  to  persons  committed  or  detained  under  a  charge 
of  crime,  the  phrase  of  the  law  is  that  all  such  persons 
are  "  presumed  innocent  until  they  are  proved  guilty." 
Is  this  phrase  a  mere  magniloquent  sham,  mere  sound, 
meaning  nothing,  keeping  the  promise  to  the  ear  but 
false  to  the  hope  ?  When  persons  are  thus  incarce 
rated,  which  are  they  treated  most  like,  the  innocent  or 
the  guilty  ?  It  is  true  this  maxim  of  the  law  could 
never  be  reasonably  supposed  to  be  taken  in  that  ab 
solute  and  sweeping  sense  in  which  it  is  perhaps  popu 
larly  understood,  and  is  often  urged  by  over-zealous 
attorneys  and  advocates.  It  cannot  be  meant  that,  in 
the  case  of  a  person  charged  with  crime,  it  is  to  be 
presumed,  until  his  guilt  is  proved,  that  his  innocence 
is  proved  and  established ;  for,  if  that  were  so,  he 
ought  at  once  to  be  acquitted  and  discharged.  His 
case  is  a  case  of  doubt.  Strictly  speaking  he  is  to  be 
treated  neither  as  innocent  nor  as  guilty,  but,  accord- 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  205 

ing  to  the  true  state  of  the  case,  and  just  as  what  he  is — 
a  person  charged  with  crime.  And  the  legal  maxim 
referred  to,  if  it  means  anything,  must  mean  as  much 
as  this,  that  a  man  charged  with  crime  presumably 
may  be  innocent,  that  such  a  man  is  not  to  be  treated 
as  guilty  until  he  is  proved  so,  and  that  the  burden  of 
proof  is  on  the  side  of  the  prosecution.  Such  a  man 
the  state  has  a  clear  right  temporarily  to  restrain 
of  his  liberty,  to  detain  before  trial,  ar;  long  as  neces 
sary,  and  no  longer.  But  the  state  can  have  no  right 
to  add  to  that  detention  one  particle  of  hardship  or 
discomfort,  of  exposure  or  privation,  of  contempt  or 
ignominy,  beyond  what  is  reasonably  required  to  se 
cure  his  person  and  prevent  his  escape.  In  all  other 
respects  he  has  a  right  to  be  treated  with  all  possible 
consideration,  respect,  and  kindness. 

It  must  be  observed,  and  the  state  must  be  pre 
sumed  to  know  it,  from  past  experience,  that  a  certain 
percentage  of  persons  thus  detained  are  bad  and  cor 
rupt  men,  guilty  of  crimes  of  greater  or  less  enormity, 
and  most  dangerous,  as  well  as  most  repulsive,  com 
panions  for  the  far  greater  percentage,  who,  it  is 
equally  known,  will  prove  to  have  been  innocent,  or 
nearly  so.  A  proper  concern  for  her  own  protection 
and  welfare,  as  well  as  a  just  regard  for  the  feelings, 
the  rights,  and  the  moral  safety  of  the  latter  parties, 
should  forbid  the  state  to  thrust  all  these  into  one  in 
discriminate  company,  before  ascertaining  which  are 
the  bad  and  which  the  good.  She  knows  that  both 
bad  and  good  are  there,  and  that,  by  companionship,  the 
bad  will  make  themselves  and  others  worse ;  yet  she 
leaves  the  business  to  take  its  course.  And  what,  in 


206  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

connection  with  the  city  of  Philadelphia,  adds  unspeak 
able  outrage  to  unspeakable  folly,  is  the  temptation 
which,  by  law,  is  thrown  in  the  way  of  police  magis 
trates,  and  to  which  they  are  notoriously  and  con 
stantly  yielding,  to  commit  large  numbers  of  persons 
to  prison  on  the  most  trivial  charges,  for  the  mere 
purpose  of  blackmailing  them — unless  the  explanation 
is  that  they  make  a  wholesale  business  of  compounding 
felonies — and  thus  swelling  the  fees,  and  perhaps  other 
perquisites,  of  the  committing  and  discharging  magis 
trate  ; — yes,  "  the  magistrate,"  we  are  obliged  to  say ; 
but,  in  such  a  case,  which  is  the  magistrate  and  which 
the  thief? 

The  inspectors  of  the  Philadelphia  County  Prison,  in 
their  last  annual  report,  have  again  urged  this  subject 
most  earnestly  upon  the  attention  of  the  legislature. 
This  is  their  statement: — "  Of  the  prisoners  committed 
for  trial  during  the  past  year  (nine  thousand  eight 
hundred  and  twenty- three),  six  thousand  six  hundred 
and  ninety-seven  were  discharged  by  the  committing 
magistrates,  and  in  the  cases  of  four  hundred  and  fif 
teen  the  bills  of  indictment  were  ignored  by  the  grand 
jury.  These  figures  show  a  larger  than  usual  propor 
tion  of  persons  discharged  without  being  brought  to 
trial  (nearly  three-fourths  of  the  whole  number  com 
mitted),  who,  as  a  general  rule,  settled  their  cases,  as  it 
is  termed,  with  the  committing  magistrates.  It  is 
obvious  that  so  long  as  the  income  of  these  officers 
depends  directly  upon  the  fees  accruing  from  cases 
brought  before  them,  commitments  for  trivial  or  un 
necessary  cases  will  be  multiplied." 

The  board  again  desires  to  express  its  opinion  of  the 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  207 

necessity  of  a  reform  in  the  police  magistracy  of  Phila 
delphia,  and  in  view  of  the  proposed  convention  to 
reform  the  State  Constitution,  it  would  invoke  the  aid 
of  all  good  citizens  to  secure  the  necessary  change 
in  our  organic  law  for  this  purpose.  As  has  been  often 
urged  in  these  annual  reports,  we  would  here  again 
submit,  that  the  great  and  foremost  evil  in  the  criminal 
department  of  Philadelphia  is  the  system  of  police  mag 
istracy  ;  and  no  reform  is  so  much  needed  as  a  change 
at  least  in  the  mode  of  compensation  of  our  committing 
magistrates.  So  long  as  their  receipts  are  directly 
dependent  upon  and  swollen  by  what  must  be  stated 
to  be  simply  a  traffic  in  the  manipulation  of  petty  crime, 
it  is  idle  to  anticipate  radical  improvement  in  the  treat 
ment  of  this  class  of  prisoners.  It  is  difficult  to  believe 
that  such  a  system  of  magistracy  can  be  tolerated  in  a 
city  like  Philadelphia,  and  that  her  citizens  can  sit 
quietly  under  so  great  a  reproach.  If  our  police 
magistrates  were  removed  from  the  sphere  of  politics, 
by  a  change  in  the  mode  of  selection  ;  if  they  held  their 
offices  by  a  good-behavior  tenure  ;  were  required  to 
be  learned  in  the  law,  and  were  compensated  by  ade 
quate  fixed  salaries,  in  place  of  fees,  a  reform  would 
be  accomplished  the  effects  of  which  upon  social  im 
provement  can  scarcely  be  estimated.* 

Here,  then,  is  one  per  cent,  of  all  the  population  of 
Philadelphia  subjected  annually  to  this  scandalous  pro 
cess,  this  organized  system  of  arbitrary  oppression  and 
plunder.  How  we  should  pity  the  darkness  and  deg 
radation  of  Turkish  or  Egyptian  society,  if  such  a 

*See  report  for  1871,  pages  17  and  1 8.     The  Constitutional  Convention  made 
the  change  suggested.      (1877.) 


208  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

shameful  system  of  abomination,  under  color  of  the 
administration  of  justice,  were  allowed  to  be  prac 
ticed  among  them  from  year  to  year.  Yet  such  is  the 
system  of  police  magistracy  in  the  city  of  Philadelphia. 
There  is  a  very  common  feeling,  it  is  true,  that  these 
persons,  though  not  actually  convicted  of  crime,  are 
yet  in  all  probability  guilty  of  it ;  or,  if  not  guilty  of 
the  precise  crime  alleged,  are  guilty  of  some  other — 
at  all  events,  are  bad  men,  keeping  bad  company,  sus 
picious  and  dangerous  characters — that,  therefore, -they 
deserve  little  consideration  in  their  treatment,  and  that 
no  great  mistake  can  be  committed  in  consigning  them 
at  once  and  together  to  a  common  prison.  This  feeling 
ignores  the  fact,  just  brought  to  view,  that  by  far  the 
larger  part — nearly  three-fourths — of  those  who  are 
committed  to  prison  charged  with  some  violation  of  law, 
are  actually  released  without  trial;  while  of  those  who 
are  brought  to  trial  more  than  three-fifths  are  acquitted. 
Now,  whatever  deductions  may  be  reasonably  made 
from  the  magnificent  largeness  of  the  legal  maxim  above 
referred  to,  that  "a  man  is  to  be  presumed  innocent 
until  he  is  proved  guilty;"  and  whatever  may  be  the 
loose  estimates  in  the  private  judgment  of  individuals, 
or  in  the  popular  mind,  in  regard  to  probable  moral 
turpitude  in  any  cases,  the  state  is  bound, — and  it  is  the 
state  that  is  here  the  responsible  agent,  for  it  is  she 
that  arranges  prisons  and  detains  prisoners, — the  state 
is  bound,  to  presume  those  to  have  been  innocent 
whose  guilt  she  has  failed  or  not  even  attempted  to 
prove,  or  who,  upon  solemn  trial,  have  been  acquitted. 
Indeed  it  would  seem  not  unreasonable  for  the  state, 
which  holds  herself  bound  to  pay  for  the  private  prop- 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  209 

erty  which  she  takes  for  the  public  good,  to  make  to 
such  parties  some  amends,  if  possible — and  still  more 
in  the  case  of  detained  witnesses — for  the  mere  deten 
tion  which  they  have  suffered,  even  though  that 
detention  had  been  attended  with  no  unnecessary 
aggravations.  If  such  aggravations,  and  that  to  a 
most  outrageous  extent,  have  been  needlessly  added, 
how  ought  the  state  to  be  visited  with  compunctions, 
as  well  as  with  a  desire  to  make  all  possible  repara 
tion, — yet  no  reparation  is  ever  made. 

It  is  true  that  the  large  and  increasing  class  of  sus 
picious  characters,  of  idle,  desperate,  and  dangerous 
men  that  congregate  especially  in  large  cities,  and 
prowl  about  the  streets  by  day  as  well  as  by  night,  may 
need  to  be  dealt  with  in  some  specia!  and  more  effective 
way  than  has  yet  been  invented.  It  is  indeed  very 
difficult  to  contrive  any  such  way  of  dealing  with  them 
consistently  with  the  principles  of  our  common  law  and 
our  free  institutions.  But,  whatever  method  is  adopted, 
it  should  not  be  by  indirection  or  caprice, — it  should  be 
straightforward,  square,  open,  regulated.  If  these  men 
are  to  be  punished,  they  should  be  punished  as  being 
just  what  they  are,  and  should  not  be  mixed  up  indis 
criminately  with  men  fully  indicted  for  definite  crime, 
on  the  one  hand,  and,  on  the  other,  with  men  charged 
with  no  crime  or  suspicion. 

We  venture  the  following  general  suggestions : — 

i.  All  persons  sentenced  to  jail  to  be  imprisoned  at 
hard  labor,  should  either  be  kept  in  strict  solitary  con 
finement,  or,  when  they  desire  it,  being  properly  classi 
fied,  should  have  the  means  of  employing  themselves 


210  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

daily  in  productive  labor.  Their  being  allowed  to  herd 
together  in  idleness  is  one  of  the  gross  abuses  of  some 
of  our  county  jails. 

2.  Persons  committed  as  idlers  and  vagrants  should 
be  treated  in  the  same  manner, — only  in  entire  separa 
tion  both  from  convicts  and  from  all  other  classes  of 

prisoners. 

% 

3.  Persons  detained  as  witnesses  should  also  have 
entirely    separate    quarters    from    all   others,  whether 
convicts,  vagrants,  or  suspected  persons.     They  should 
have  the  means  of  perfect  privacy  or  of  mutual  associa 
tion    at    pleasure ;    also,    the    means    of   reading   and 
writing  and  of  such  employment  at  labor  as  they  may 
choose.     With   these  might  be  joined   another   class, 
which  fortunately  is  likely  to  be  but  small,  viz.,  persons 
committed  for  contempt.     Such  persons  may  be  highly 
respectable  men,  guilty  only  of  some  impropriety  of 
conduct  or  bearing  or  of  declining  to  perform  some 
legal  mandate,  and  that  sometimes  from  high  though 
mistaken  motives  of  duty;  and  it  is  most  unreasonable 
that  they  should  be  thrust  into  prison  among  felons 
and   vagabonds.     The   restraint   of   their   liberty  and 
that  for  an  unlimited  time, — for,  curiously  enough,  this 
is  the  only  class  of  persons  whose  period  of  imprison 
ment  is,  under  present  law  and  usage,  terminable  only 
upon  reformation, — such  restraint  is  leverage  enough 
wherewith  to  act  upon  their  wills,  without  forcing  upon 
them    the    grievous    alternative    of   submission    or    of 
"rotting"  in  such  a  jail. 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  211 

4.  Persons  committed  under  charge  of  crime  should 
also  have  their  separate  quarters  and  should  be  treated, 
in  general,  as  the  last-mentioned  classes  of  prisoners ; 
but  with  some  important  modifications,  such  as,  that 
those  charged  with  graver  crimes  should  be  secured 
with  the  greater  caution,  and  that  they  all  should  be 
more  or  less  rigorously  confined  to  their  separate  cells 
or  classified  for  mutual  association,  if  they  so  prefer, 
according  to  their  conduct,  known  history,  and  ascer 
tained  characters. 

5.  We    most    heartily    and    earnestly    endorse    the 
recommendation  of  the  inspectors  of  the  Philadelphia 
County  Prison,  above  cited,  in   reference  to  the  reform 
of  the  police  magistracy  of  that  city. 

Now  we  are  aware  that  all  this  may  be  met  and 
smothered  in  the  cold  blanket  of  a  calculating  economy. 

It  may  be  avoided  by  running  away.  It  may  be 
buried  and  forgotten  under  arithmetical  estimates. 
The  cost,  the  huge  outlay,  the  enormous  expense  of 
making  such  immense  and  sumptuous  provision  for 
the  entertainment  of  prisoners  !  We  answer  that  here 
we  will  not  enter  into  any  petty  calculation  of  dollars 
and  cents.  If  this  thing  ought  to  be  done,  if  it  is  due 
to  the  classes  of  men  whom  the  state  thus  takes  into 
her  custody,  then  is  the  state  bound  to  do  it  at  what 
ever  cost.  The  state  cannot  afford  to  practice  inhu 
manity.  The  state  cannot  afford  to  commit  injustice, 
still  less  can  she  afford  to  commit  it  systematically  and 
on  an  enormous  scale,  deliberately  and  from  year  to 
year,  and  talk  of  saving  a  few  paltry  dollars. 


2 1  2  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

The  truth  is,  and  we  repeat  it,  this  mixing  together 
in  the  society  of  one  common  prison,  and  often  crowd 
ing  into  the  same  cells,  by  night  as  well  as  by  day,  all 
these  various  classes  of  persons  in  custody — thrusting 
them,  like  so  many  swine,  into  one  pen — is  nothing  less 
than  a  burning  disgrace  to  the  police  and  jurisprudence 
of  a  civilized  state.  It  is  an  outrageous  injustice,  an  un 
speakable  abomination.  It  is  simply  astounding  that 
it  should  have  been  allowed  to  continue,  without  a 
thorough  remedy,  to  the  present  day. 

But  this  is  not  all.  Such  a  state  of  our  prisons  is 
not  only  an  injustice  to  the  individual,  it  is  a  great 
public  evil  ;  it  is  one  of  the  most  fruitful  sources  of 
crime,  furnishing  the  most  admirable  contrivances  for 
inviting  and  facilitating  its  propagation.  Thus  the 
wrong  reacts  upon  the  wrong-doer ;  and  the  penu 
rious  system  of  injustice  costs  more  than  the  generous 
remedy.  It  turns  out  here,  as  it  always  will,  that  the 
course  of  humanity  and  right  is  the  cheapest  in  the  end. 

So  far  as  the  "  generous  remedy  "  has  been  tried,  it 
has  proved  abundantly  successful.  Say  the  inspectors 
of  the  Philadelphia  prison : — "  The  decrease  in  the 
number  of  the  commitments  of  females  is  much  greater 
than  in  that  of  males,  and  is  so  large  during  the  four 
years  that  have  elapsed  since  the  extension  of  the 
female  department,  that  it  may  be  fairly  attributed  to 
the  increased  accommodation  for  female  prisoners,  that 
was  secured  by  the  transfer  of  the  old  debtors'  apart 
ment  to  the  female  department.  The  separation  of 
female  prisoners,  which  was  thus  accomplished,  with 
the  greater  facilities  for  the  enforcement  of  prison  dis 
cipline,  has  resulted  in  a  marked  diminution  of  vagrancy 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  213 

and  crime  in  the  female  population  of  our  city.  The 
expenditure  originally  involved  in  the  extension  of  the 
female  department  has  proved  a  true  economy,  and 
the  results  attained  support  the  arguments  which  have 
been  so  repeatedly  urged  in  favor  of  an  extension  of 
the  more  important  and  over-crowded  male  depart 
ment  of  the  prison."  They  add  :— 

"The  board  would  here  repeat  the  views  expressed 
in  previous  reports,  upon  the  subject  of  an  extension 
of  the  prison,  and  again  call  the  attention  of  the  legis 
lature  to  the  incapacity  of  the  prison  for  the  proper 
confinement  and  employment  of  its  large  male  popu 
lation.  In  every  aspect,  sanitary,  moral,  and  economi 
cal,  the  injurious  effects  of  its  over-crowded  condition 
are  manifest.  The  results  of  improved  accommodation 
in  the  female  department,  previously  cited,  have  shown 
that  the  great  growth  of  crime  and  vagrancy  is  directly 
stimulated  by  the  undue  congregation  of  prisoners. 
It  can  scarcely  be  doubted  that  the  collection  of  a 
number  of  prisoners  in  a  single  cell  soon  reduces  all 
to  the  moral  level  of  the  worst  prisoner;  and  the  un 
ceasing  intercourse  which  results  from  the  original 
construction  of  the  prison,  with  a  view  to  the  separate 
system,  fosters  the  moral  contagion  more  actively  than 
in  prisons  not  designed  for  this  system.  * 
The  board  feels  that  this  subject  can  be  no  longer 
overlooked,  and  that  either  the  extension  of  the  convict 
blocks,  or  the  construction  of  a  new  prison,  has  become 
a  necessity." 

Hitherto  convicted  felons  have  been  the  heroes  of 
our  prison  economy.  They  have  been  treated  with 
great  respect.  They  have  been  a  sort  of  little  standing 


214  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

army.  Their  discipline  has  absorbed  the  almost  ex 
clusive  attention  of  all  parties,  while  the  organizing 
and  training  of  the  militia  has  been  neglected.  We 
need  now  to  turn  our  attention  emphatically  to  the 
municipal  bridewells  and  all  the  over-crowded  houses 
of  primary  detention  ;  to  the  police  arrangements  which 
precede  the  processes  of  trial  and  conviction,  or  which, 
perhaps,  through  gross  abuse  and  mismanagement, 
not  only  never  lead,  but  are  never  even  intended  to 
lead  to  such  a  conclusion. 


XIII.    SUMMARY. 

The  board  begs  now  to  resume  and  recapitulate  the 
principal  points  which  they  have  endeavored  to  make, 
in  relation  to  the  whole  subject  of  crime  and  prison 
economy,  including,  with  those  which  have  passed 
under  discussion,  some  which  have  been  merely  al 
luded  to  as  preliminary,  and  presenting  all  in  one 
connected  view. 

i.  For  dealing  with  crime  preventive  rather  than 
remedial  measures  to  be  chiefly  relied  upon — among 
these : — 

(a.)   A  thorough  system  of  universal  education. 

(6.)  Special  and  effective  measures  for  the  care  of 
truant,  vagrant,  neglected,  and  over-tasked  children. 

(c.)  Reformatory  schools  and  houses  of  correction  to 
be  provided  to  a  much  larger  extent  for  the  various 
grades  of  juvenile  offenders. 


PRISON  E  CONOMY.  2 1  5 

(d.)  Due  provision  for  the  proper  care  of  all  the 
poor  and  helpless. 

(e.)  Effective  laws  for  the  suppression  of  intemper 
ance,  which  is  one  of  the  most  prolific  sources  of  crime. 

(f.)  Due  provision  for  the  restraint  and  employment 
of  all  idle  vagrants. 

(g.)  Due  provision  in  the  county  and  municipal 
prisons  for  the  separate  and  proper  treatment  of 
vagrants,  detained  witnesses,  and  persons  charged  with 
crime,  as  well  as  convicts. 

2.  The  remedial  system,  or  prison  economy  proper. 
This  should  be  based  upon  the  fundamental  principle 
of  reformation  through  punishment,  and  not  of  punish 
ment  only  as  its  proper  end.  It  should  contain, 
among  others,  the  following  features  : — 

(a.)  Sufficient  provision  for  the  separate  confinement 
of  each  convict. 

(b.)  After  a  longer  or  shorter  period  of  separate  con 
finement,  and  the  performance  of  certain  prescribed 
tasks,  provision  made  for  the  employment  of  the  con 
victs  in  voluntary,  productive  labor,  as  a  means  of 
moral  improvement,  as  a  preparation  for  their  future 
self-support,  and  as  necessary  for  their  present  health 
of  body  and  mind. 

(c.)  Unless  solitary  labor  should  be  preferred,  this 
labor  to  be  performed  in  small  companies  or  families, 


21 6  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

properly  selected,  the  members  having  free  intercourse 
together,  and  ultimately  being  mutually  responsible  for 
one  another's  conduct. 

(d.)  The  proceeds  of  the  labor  to  be  appropriated  :— 
First,  to  defray  the  current  expenses  of  the  convict 
and  indemnify  the  state  ;  secondly,  to  contribute  to  the 
support  of  the  convict's  family  if  necessary  ;  thirdly,  to 
the  convict  himself,  to  go  partly  to  form  a  reserve  fund 
against  the  time  of  his  release,  and  partly  as  he  may 
choose,  for  procuring  present  alleviations  and  comforts. 

(e.)  Instruction  should  be  given  to  all  the  convicts, 
as  they  may  need : — First,  in  some  trade  or  handicraft; 
secondly,  in  the  elements  of  learning  and  knowledge  ; 
and,  thirdly,  in  the  principles  and  practice  of  morality 
and  religion. 

(f.)  Considerate  and  humane  treatment  to  be  em 
phatically  insisted  on,  using,  as  far  as  possible,  moral 
influence  instead  of  physical  force,  and  endeavoring, 
above  all  things,  to  develop  the  self-respect  and  man 
hood  of  the  prisoners,  and  their  better  and  kindlier 
natures. 

(g.)  A  careful  classification  of  the  prisoners  to  be 
constantly  kept  up,  and  from  time  to  time  corrected  ; — 
not  based  upon  any  external  or  arbitrary  considera 
tions,  but  upon  character  and  conduct. 

(//.)  Provision  to  be  made  for  securing  a  corps  of 
judicious,  trained,  and,  eventually,  experienced  keep 
ers,  for  rendering  their  profession  honorable  and  re- 


PRISON  E  CONOMY.  2  I  7 

spectable;  and,  to  this  end,  a  special  school  for  their 
training  to  be  established. 

(z.)  A  commutation  of  meritorious  conduct  and  prob 
able  reformation  for  mere  lapse  of  time,  as  the  ground 
of  final  discharge.  That  is  to  say,  convicts  may  earn 
their  releas'e  by  such  evidence  of  meritorious  conduct 
and  habits  as  will  imply  their  probable  permanent  re 
formation. 

(/.)  That  there  shall  be,  in  the  case  of  each  convict, 
a  certain  time-sentence,  graduated  according  to  his  of 
fense,  but,  in  each  case,  for  a  much  longer  period  than 
at  present,  so  as  to  leave  full  opportunity  for  the  effect 
of  the  commutation  and  the  working  out  of  the  reform 
atory  process;  premising  that  the  ideal  perfection  of 
the  plan,  which  makes  the  discharge  of  every  prisoner 
absolutely  dependent  upon  his  reformation,  would  re 
quire  too  great  a  revolution  in  legal  and  popular  ideas 
to  be  as  yet  expected  or  asked  for. 

(/£.)  Some  definite  and  detailed  record  or  system  of 
marks  to  be  kept,  which,  under  fixed  rules,  may  be  a 
guide  for  classification  and  rewards,  as  well  as  for  the 
final  judgment ;  having  a  debit  as  well  as  a  credit  side, 
and  -providing  for  loss  of  standing  and  class,  or  even 
for  a  remanding  to  the  cell,  in  case  of  misconduct. 

(/.)  Intermediate  prisons  or  houses  of  discharge  to 
be  provided,  where  the  prisoners — still  remaining  un 
discharged  from  their  sentence — may  be  finally  tested, 
by  being  trusted  with  a  great  degree  of  liberty,  and 
left  in  large  measure  to  control  themselves,  under  most 


2l8  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

of  the  ordinary  temptations  of  social  life,  yet  liable,  for 
unfaithfulness,  for  misconduct,  or  attempted  escape,  to 
be  degraded  and  sent  back  to  begin  their  work  over 
again. 

(m.)  Refuges  to  be  provided  for  released  prisoners, 
to  facilitate  their  re-introduction  to  the  bosom  of  society, 
and  where  they  can  have,  at  their  own  expense,  lodging 
and  maintenance  and  means  of  employment,  until  they 
can  procure  employment  elsewhere. 

Such  are  the  outlines  of  a  general  plan  of  criminal 
police  and  prison  economy.  It  is  by  no  means  pre 
sumed  that  every  point  is  unquestionably  established, 
still  less  that  the  plan  is  complete  for  working  pur 
poses.  No  name  is  given  to  it  of  any  system,  whether 
old  or  new.  It  is  not  denominated  the  separate  or  the 
congregate  or  the  mixed  system,  the  English,  the  Irish, 
the  Belgian,  the  Massachusetts,  or  the  Pennsylvania 
system.  It  must  stand,  not  upon  the  prejudices  or  the 
associations,  whether  favorable  or  unfavorable,  con 
nected  with  a  name,  but  upon  its  own  intrinsic  merits, 
in  detail  as  well  as  in  gross.  In  view  of  these,  then,  it 
is  respectfully  submitted  for  dispassionate  considera 
tion.  If  it  shall  have  the  effect  to  awaken  such  an 
interest  in  the  subject  and  its  discussion  as  shall  lead 
to  systematic  practical  action,  this  board  will  be  more 
than  rewarded,  more  than  satisfied. 

What  is  especially  needed  in  this  matter  is  a  well- 
considered,  complete,  and  consistent  system.  Our 
whole  scheme  must  be  remodeled  to  meet  the  de 
mands  of  the  times,  the  state  of  our  modern  civili- 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  219 

zation,  and  the  progressive  ideas  of  free,  popular 
government.  Partial  expedients  and  reforms  lead 
only  to  eventual  disappointment  and  discouragement. 
They  are  only  a  piece  of  new  cloth  patched  upon  an 
old  garment,  wasting  the  good  and  making  the  whole 
worse. 

Such  a  complete  system  would,  of  course,  require 
unity  of  control. 

All  the  prisons  and  houses  of  detention  in  the  Com 
monwealth,  whether  State,  county,  or  municipal,  should 
be  placed  under  the  supervision  and  direction  of  one 
head,  or  of  one  board  of  management,  representing  the 
authority  of  the  State.  In  respect  to  all  matters  of 
prison  construction  and  prison  discipline,  the  county 
and  municipal  authorities  should  be  required  to  act 
under  the  direction  of  this  central  and  supreme  au 
thority. 

That  something  must  speedily  be  done  in  the  path 
of  reform  seems  to  be  beyond  question.  To  judge  of 
any  mode  of  prison  discipline,  four  tests  have  been 
proposed : — 

1.  Does  it  secure  the  custody  of  the  convict? 

2.  Does  it  pay  its  own  expenses  ? 

3.  Does  it  check  and  diminish  crime  ? 

4.  Does  it  reform  the  criminal  ? 

Of  these  tests  the  first  is  of  prime  importance  as  a 
necessary  condition  of  all  the  others.  If  prisons  are 
not  secure  they  are  useless  for  any  purpose.  The 


220  PJtlSON  ECONOMY. 

second  test  is  of  some  incidental  importance,  but  of 
no  essential  consequence.  The  third  and  fourth  bring 
out  the  great  objects  of  imprisonment.  The  fourth  is 
of  the  highest  importance,  practically  as  well  as  mor 
ally,  for  on  it  the  third  also  is  largely  dependent. 
Now  our  prisons,  with  a  few  exceptions,  are  places  of 
secure  custody,  and  so  far  our  present  system  suc 
ceeds.  But  in  view  of  the  other  three  tests,  and  par 
ticularly  of  the  last,  we  fear  it  must  be  pronounced  a 
failure  ;  and  if  so,  where  is  the  fault,  and  how  can  it  be 
remedied?  These  are  the  questions  to  be  earnestly 
pondered.  We  have  endeavored,  though  in  a  very 
fragmentary  and  imperfect  way,  to  show  how  they 
should  be  answered ;  and  while  our  suggestions  have 
been,  for  the  most  part,  the  result  of  our  independent 
observation  and  reflection,  and  must  stand  upon  their 
own  merits,  and  no  man's  authority,  it  may  yet  be  of 
interest  to  add  that,  according  to  the  report  of  our 
highly  respected  fellow-citizen,  Joseph  R.  Chandler, 
Esq.,  the  International  Prison  Congress  lately  assem 
bled  in  London  reached  the  following  propositions  or 
general  results,  as  stated  in  the  concluding  report  of 
their  executive  committee  : — 

"  First. — Recognizing,  as  a  fundamental  fact,  that  the 
protection  of  society  is  the  object  for  which  penal  codes 
exist,  the  committee  believe  that  this  protection  is  not 
only  consistent  with,  but  absolutely  demands,  the  enun 
ciation  of  the  principle,  that  the  moral  regeneration  of 
the  prisoner  should  be  the  primary  aim  of  prison  dis 
cipline. 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  221 

"  Second. — A  progressive  classification  of  prisoners 
should  be  adopted  in  all  prisons. 

"  Third. — In  the  treatment  of  prisoners  all  disciplin 
ary  punishments  that  inflict  unnecessary  pain  or  hu 
miliation  should  be  abolished. 

"Fourth. — To  impel  a  prisoner  to  self-exertion  should 
be  the  aim  of  systems  of  prison  discipline,  which  can 
never  be  effective  unless  they  succeed  in  gaining  the 
will  of  the  convict. 

"  Fifth. —  Work,  education,  and  religion  are  the  three 
great  forces  on  which  prison  administrators  should 
rely." 

The  board  conclude  this  branch  of  their  report  with 
earnestly  and  formally  recommending  to  the  legislature 
the  prompt  appointment  of  a  commission  of  prudent  and 
cautious  men,  learned  in  the  law,  fully  abreast  with  the 
times,  and  imbued  with  the  spirit  of  progress,  as  well 
as  of  conservation,  who  shall  not  only  make  thorough 
inquiry  into  the  principles  and  practice  of  penal  juris 
prudence  and  prison  economy,  but  shall  be  empowered 
and  directed  to  revise  all  the  existing  statutes  on  these 

o 

subjects,  and  to  mature  and  present  for  adoption  by 
the  legislature  a  scheme  of  legislation  based  upon  the 
principle  of  the  prevention  of  crime,  and  the  reforma 
tion  of  criminals,  as  its  fundamental  ends. 

The  board  recommends  the  appointment  of  a  spe 
cial  commission,  not  for  merely  making  a  report  to  be 
read  and  printed  and  forgotten  ;  not  for  mere  curious 


222  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

inquiry  or  idle  investigation ;  but  for  immediate  prac 
tical  action. 

Let  Pennsylvania  once  more  take  the  lead  of  the 
civilized  world  in  this  great  and  pressing  reform. 

All  which  is  respectfully  submitted. 

By  order  of  the  board. 

GEO.  L.  HARRISON, 

President. 

NOTE. 

To  show  how  far  the  views  above  set  forth  have 
approved  themselves  upon  further  investigation  and 
experience,  and  to  bring  the  state  of  the  question  down 
to  the  present  time,  the  following  brief  statements  are 
added  :— 

In  Ireland,  the  progressive  system  of  imprisonment 
is  still  prospering.  Denmark  has  adopted  it  in  its 
entirety.  Sweden  and  Norway  are  pressing  towards 
the  same  goal.  Switzerland  is  following  fast.  In 
several  of  the  cantons  the  whole  system  has  been 
adopted,  with  the  exception  of  the  intermediate  prison. 
Neufchatel  is  upon  the  point  of  introducing  it  com 
plete — intermediate  prison,  provisional  or  preparatory 
liberation,  and  all.  In  Italy,  similar  arrangements  have 
been  inaugurated.  Progress  in  this  direction  has  been 
made  in  England,  especially  in  respect  to  the  patron 
age  of  discharged  prisoners.  In  Belgium  and  Hol 
land,  the  cellular  (separate)  system  still  maintains  its 
ground  ;  though  in  Holland  the  progressive  principle 
has  found  numerous  adherents.  In  Germany  and 


.      PRISON  E CON O MY.  223 

Austria,  the  subject  of  prison  economy  and  reform  is 
undergoing  a  general  investigation  and  discussion. 
The  result  cannot  be  doubtful.  Great  reforms  have 
been  made  and  are  in  progress  in  France  and  Russia. 
Several  of  the  States  of  our  own  Union,  and  particu 
larly  New  York,  have  been  making  great  progress  in 
the  same  direction.  Pennsylvania,  it  must  be  acknowl 
edged,  has  done  little  as  yet  to  maintain  or  recover 
her  ancient  prestige. 

At  the  meeting  of  the  International  Penitentiary 
Commission  at  Bruchsal  (Baden),  three  questions  were 
distinctly  raised :  (i)  Can  criminals  be  reformed?  If 
so,  (2)  on  what  principles  should  reformatory  treat 
ment  be  based  ?  (3)  By  what  agencies  or  methods 
should  such  a  system  be  worked  ?  And  they  were 
distinctly  answered  in  favor  of  the  progressive  system, 
as  outlined  in  the  foregoing  report  of  1872. 

M.  Guillaume,  commissioned  to  prepare  a  draft  for 
a  penal  system  in  several  cantons  of  Switzerland  ;  M. 
De  Fleury,  commissioned  for  a  like  purpose  in  Brazil  ; 
Messrs.  Michaux  and  Marsangy,  members  of  the  great 
French  parliamentary  commission  on  penitentiary  re 
form, — all,  without  consultation  or  concert,  have,  in 
elaborate  reports,  reached  substantially  the  same  con 
clusion. 

1 .  Proper  care  and  training  of  the  young  is  premised 
in  forefront  of  all  measures  for  the  prevention  of  crime. 

2.  Cellular    separation    is    recommended    for    short 
terms  of  imprisonment,  as  a  preliminary  detention  for 
long  terms,  and  as  an  occasional  corrective. 


224  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

3.  They  all  earnestly  support,  for  long-term  prison 
ers,  a  system  of  progressive  classification,  with  labor 
and  instruction,   in  which  the  fate   of  the   criminal  is 
largely  placed  in  his  own  hands,  and  which  is  gradually 
relaxed  and  softened  as  he  earns  increased  indulgence 
and  privilege ;  until, 

4.  Through  the  intermediate  prison,  with  little  more 
than  moral  detention,  he  passes  into 

5.  Conditional  liberation,  with    kindly   supervision  ; 
and  thus,  finally,  to  his  complete  discharge,  a  reformed 
and  useful  and  happy  man,  "  redeemed,  regenerated, 
disenthralled." 

The  International  Prison  Congress  in  New  York,  in 
1876,  besides  a  general  approval  of  these  same  princi 
ples  in  regard  to  the  management  of  prisons  and 
treatment  of  prisoners,  very  strongly  and  distinctly 
endorsed  the  views  of  this  report,  in  the  matter  (i)  of 
the  imprisonment  of  witnesses,  (2)  of  county  jails,  (3) 
of  the  treatment  of  discharged  prisoners,  and  (4)  of 
reformatory  institutions,  especially  for  juveniles. 


PRISON  REFORM. 


In  presenting  again  to  your  honorable  bodies  the 
subject  of  prison  reform,  the  board  ask  for  your 
thoughtful  consideration  of  a  question  the  most  mo 
mentous  and  grave  which  can  be  laid  before  you. 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  225 

Temporary  matters  of  law  or  polity  submitted  for 
your  decision,  are  in  comparison  but  of  local  and 
superficial  importance,  but  the  problem  of  the  lessen 
ing  of  the  mass  of  crime  and  vice  and  ignorance  in 
our  penitentiaries  and  prisons  and  reformatory  schools, 
the  alleviation  of  the  cankering  sore,  never  to  be 
cured  in  the  body  politic,  is  one  which  touches  not 
only  the  moneyed  interest,  but  the  civilization,  the 
vitality,  and  the  religion  of  the  state. 

We  have  grown  apathetic  to  the  existence  of  the 
criminal  classes.  Nothing  so  dulls  the  moral  sense 
as  custom,  and  we  have  seen  the  barred  windows  of 
the  county  jail,  or  the  massive  walls  of  the  peniten 
tiary  since  childhood ;  have  learned  to  look  upon  the 
miserable  wretches  behind  their  bolts  and  gratings  as 
human  beings,  perhaps,  but  as  alien  to  ourselves, — as 
creatures  of  another  race  and  age. 

These  strongholds  of  misery,  and  the  thieves  and 
murderers  who  tenant  them,  have  come  to  appear  to 
us  as  commonplace,  though  inexorable  a  fact,  as  the 
ground  on  which  the  prisons  are  built.  It  is  difficult 
for  the  best  man  actually  to  realize  that  he  personally 
has  a  duty  to  fulfill  to  them.  The  thief,  the  murderer, 
the  degraded  woman,  are  here  ;  but  why  they  are  here, 
by  what  strange  mischance  they  missed  their  place  in 
nature's  wise  economy  in  this  life,  or  where  they  are  to 
go  when  this  life  is  over,  are  questions  with  which 
society  has  hitherto  troubled  itself  too  little.  The  or 
dinary  citizen  has  no  uneasy  doubts  that  part  of  the 
guilt  of  their  existence  rests  on  himself,  and  shows  no 
anxiety  for  their  sake  or  his  own,  that  they  should  be 
brought,  if  possible,  to  the  same  level  of  decency, 


226  PXISON  ECONOMY. 

honest  living,  and  chance  of  elevation.  If  one  of  these 
wretches  jars  against  his  own  orderly  life,  he  promptly 
locks  him  in  jail  or  penitentiary,  or  hangs  him,  and 
then  washing  his  hands  in  self-righteousness,  declares 
himself,  like  Pilate,  "free  from  the  blood  of  this  man." 

After  a  year,  or  term  of  years  in  prison  (during 
which  the  orderly  citizen  is  taxed  for  his  support),  the 
convict  is  released,  to  become,  through  crime  or  pauper 
ism,  a  yet  heavier  burden  upon  the  tax-payer,  and 
hardened  and  embittered  by  punishment,  to  spread 
more  widely  his  virulent  moral  poison. 

Here,  in  plain  words,  is  the  ordinary  history  of  the 
treatment  of  crime  ;  and  there  is  assuredly  no  function 
of  government  in  which  society  has  proved  itself  so 
willfully  blind  to  its  own  interests,  putting  aside  all 
question  of  humanity.  When  a  fatal  epidemic  is  abroad, 
doing  its  deadly  work  upon  our  bodies,  all  the  skill  and 
foresight  and  care  which  we  can  command  are  brought 
forward  to  foil  or  banish  it.  Municipalities  and  indi 
viduals  alike  bestir  themselves  with  eager  zeal  to 
purify  the  air,  to  remove  every  trace  of  stagnant  water, 
carrion,  or  other  foul  deposit  which  may  breed  disease  ; 
the  medical  science  of  the  growth  of  centuries  is  sum 
moned  to  detect  the  secret  agents  of  these  subtle 
poisons,  and  to  counteract  them.  But  since  society 
was  organized  this  contagion  of  crime,  fatal  alike  to 
soul  and  body,  has  been  at  work,  and  what  has  been 
done  to  combat  it? 

The  sole  remedy  suggested  by  the  wisdom  of  ages 
was  the  locking  up  of  the  criminal,  and  at  a  given 
period,  his  release,  with  whetted  appetite  for  his  un 
wholesome  work.  It  is  precisely  as  though  we  should 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  227 

cover  over  a  malarious  swamp  for  a  certain  time  until 
its  vapors  had  gathered  fresh  malignant  venom,  and 
then  set  them  free  on  their  death-dealing  errand. 

It  should  be  observed  here  that,  in  the  examination 
of  this  question,  we  are  not  to  consider  special  cases 
of  wise  and  beneficent  administration  of  prison  or 
penitentiary ;  or  on  the  other  hand  the  most  besotted 
and  barbarous  treatment;  but  we  must  look  at  the 
general  character  and  condition  of  prison  economy  and 
discipline,  as  we  find  it  in  our  own  State,  and  as  we 
know  from  personal  observation  or  other  knowledge 
that  it  exists  anywhere. 

We  can  point  to  examples  of  most  just  and  credit 
able  concern  for  the  welfare  of  the  incarcerated  hu 
man  beings  under  certain  management,  and  again  to 
the  grossest  neglect  and  abuse  of  these  unhappy  crimi 
nals  in  the  other  direction.  It  is  the  terrible  fact  that 
stares  us  in  the  face  that,  at  least  in  every  moral  point 
of  view,  the  latter  is  the  general  characteristic  of  the 
prisons  of  the  whole  world. 

As  a  means  of  improvement  in  the  administration  of 
our  own  county  jails,  we  strongly  recommend  now,  as 
in  the  past,  the  enactment  of  a  general  law,  which  will 
take  from  the  sheriffs  of  the  counties  the  control  of 
the  prisons,  and  provide  for  boards  of  inspectors,  who 
will  appoint  suitable  persons  as  wardens  to  administer 
these  institutions. 

In  consideration  of  the  progress  made  by  mankind 
in  science  and  knowledge  of  every  sort,  the  cruelty, 
and  in  many  cases  the  barbarity,  of  its  modes  of  deal 
ing  with  crime  appear  almost  incredible  to  the  student 
of  political  economy.  Something  has  been  done  within 


228  PRISON  E  CONOMY. 

a  few  years  to  solve  the  problem  with  the  broad  and 
enlightened  truths  and  sound  practical  sense  which  it 
deserves,  but  the  success  has  been  but  meagre,  consist 
ing  so  far  more  of  attempt  than  execution.  That  Penn 
sylvania  may  at  least  endeavor  to  keep  pace  with  that 
little,  is  the  motive  of  your  board  in  bringing  the  sub 
ject  thus  urgently  before  your  honorable  bodies  at  the 
present  time,  We  will  summarize  as  briefly  as  pos 
sible  the  present  status  of  the  reformatory  effort,  and 
its  desired  promotion  at  your  hands. 

The  motive  idea  of  the  treatment  of  criminals  was, 
until  a  comparatively  recent  date,  simply  punitive  and 
deterrent,  not  unmixed,  in  coarser  grades  of  society, 
with  the  sentiment  of  revenge.  The  ill-doer  was  to 
be  driven  to  repentance,  or  at  least  terrified  from  a 
repetition  of  his  offense,  by  actual  physical  suffering. 
'One  hundred  years  ago  this  mode  of  treatment  had 
reached  its  full  development  even  in  Christian  Protestant 
England.  Capital  punishment  was  inflicted  for  two 
hundred  different  offenses ;  men  were  hanged  for  steal 
ing  a  loaf  of  bread,  for  breaking  a  hop-pole,  as  cer 
tainly  as  for  murder ;  debtors  suffered  the  same  treat 
ment  in  the  jails  as  other  prisoners,  and  this  treatment 
consisted  in  the  herding  of  men  and  women  promis 
cuously  in  cells  reeking  with  filth,  and  wet  with  the  foul 
damps  oozing  from  the  ground,  with  only  an  aperture 
of  four  inches  by  eight  to  admit  the  already  poisoned  air 
from  the  dark  passage-way.  "  Debtors  in  gangs  were 
padlocked  by  the  leg  to  the  different  links  of  a  long 
chain  stapled  to  the  wall,  and  at  night  the  prisoners 
were  laid  on  their  backs  and  caged  by  iron  bars  passing 
over  their  bodies,  while  spiked  iron  collars  about  their 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  229 

necks  prevented  any  movement  of  the  head."  The 
sole  employment  of  these  prisoners  was  gambling  and 
drinking ;  a  bar  for  prisoners  being  kept  by  every 
jailor,  whose  interest  it  was  to  lead  them  into  de 
bauchery  and  excess. 

The  labors  of  John  Howard  removed  many  of  the 
abuses  of  this  system.  Prisoners  no  longer  rot  out 
half  their  lives  in  English  and  American  prisons  from 
inability  to  pay  the  extortionate  demands  of  brutal 
keepers.  They  are  not  suffered  to  die  in  darkness, 
filth,  and  foul  air,  of  jail-fever  or  starvation  ;  but  while 
the  physical  discipline  is  ameliorated  by  reason  and 
humanity,  the  moral  treatment  in  our  jails  is  founded 
on  the  same  principle  as  in  the  days  of  Howard.  The 
prisoner  is  punished  precisely  as  a  dog  is  made  to  feel 
the  lash  to  deter  him  from  ill-doing,  while  no  more 
attempt  is  made  to  convince  him  of  his  guilt,  or  to  put 
in  his  hands  the  means,  when  discharged,  of  avoiding 
his  evil  courses,  or  gaining  an  honest  livelihood,  than 
if  he  were  in  reality  a  brute. 

Even  in  the  penitentiaries  where  the  labor  has  been 
made  part  of  the  punitive  and  reformatory  discipline, 
there  is  still  large  limit  for  reform.  In  many  state 
prisons  the  contract  or  leasing  system  is  in  use,  by 
which  the  convict  is  regarded  simply  as  a  money-mak 
ing  machine  for  the  contractor. 

In  the  most  humanely  governed  of  these  institutions 
the  application  of  moral  influences  is  but  occasional 
and  unsystematic.  The  exhortations  of  a  chaplain, 
however  zealous  and  faithful,  to  several  hundred  pris 
oners,  must  necessarily  prove  less  efficacious  in  prompt 
ing  the  individual  convict  to  the  exertions  which  will 


230  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

give  him  his  lost  place  among  honest  men,  than  a  legal 
ized,  unalterable  system  which  will  affect  all  his  hourly 
and  daily  work  and  thoughts,  and,  through  them, 
inspire  with  hope  in  the  future  and  that  faith  in  himself 
and  in  the  humanity  of  his  fellow-men,  of  which  a  long 
course  of  crime  has  robbed  him. 

There  is  such  a  system,  conceived  in  the  purest 
spirit  of  humanity,  and  based  upon  a  profound  knowl 
edge  of  the  needs  and  requirements  of  human  nature. 
It  has  already  been  tested  thoroughly,  and  we  present, 
or  rather  re-present,  a  modification  of  this  system  for 
your  consideration.  Having  submitted  it  heretofore 
with  much  amplification,  we  shall  not  dwell  upon  its 
details  at  any  length,  but  touch  only  upon  a  few  points, 
readily  attainable,  and  which  furnish  a  sure  outlook, 
as  we  believe,  to  salutary  results. 

The  ideal  plan  in  its  entirety  is  probably  impractica 
ble  in  the  present  condition  of  public  sentiment.  Its 
plain  idea  was  to  generate  in  the  convict's  mind  the 
incitement  of  hope  rather  than  the  sullenness  of  despair, 
which  is  the  slow  outgrowth  of  an  inevitable  punish 
ment.  It  was  devised  and  partially  carried  into  exe 
cution  by  Captain  Maconochie  in  a  penal  colony  in 
Australia,  and  the  jail  at  Birmingham,  England. 

This  method  was  briefly  as  follows: — The  convict 
was  not  to  be  sentenced  for  any  given  time,  but  until 
he  should  have  earned  a  certain  number  of  marks 
according  to  his  crime.  These  marks  were  given  for 
good  conduct,  industry,  neatness,  &c.  They  were 
reckoned  as  money,  and  with  them  he  was  required  to 
pay  first  for  his  clothing,  food,  &c.;  out  of  the  surplus 
only  could  he  buy  his  release.  The  prisoner  also 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  231 

passed  through  certain  stages  or  conditions,  being 
subjected  at  first  to  solitary  confinement,  low  diet, 
absolute  idleness,  with  but  a  small  opportunity  of  gaining 
the  marks  of  approval  by  his  patience  and  obedience. 
The  permission  to  labor  was  received  as  a  relief. 
From  this  period  the  way  lay  open  to  him  to  earn 
better  food,  lodging,  and,  finally,  freedom. 

The  principle  of  this  method  will,  we  are  confident, 
be  recognized  by  you  as  that  which  underlies  every 
wise  system  of  government.  It  is  simply  the  attach 
ment  of  inflexibly  certain  rewards  and  punishments  to 
good  and  bad  conduct.  This  is  the  outline  of  the 
great  scheme  of  polity  established  by  the  Creator  for 
His  rational  creatures  in  this  life,  and  we  can  not 
assuredly  act  unwisely  in  imitating  it,  however  feebly, 
in  our  dealings  with  those  of  our  unfortunate  brethren 
who,  from  mischance  of  birth  or  education,  are  thus 
made  dependent  upon  us  to  gain  their  knowledge  of 
Christianity,  or  faith  in  its  teachings. 

A  modification  of  this  system  has  been  practiced  for 
nearly  twenty  years  in  Ireland  by  Sir  Walter  Crofton. 
Here  there  are  three  prisons  through  which  each  con 
vict  passes.  The  first  penal,  with  solitary  confinement ; 
the  second  reformatory,  where  the  inmates  are  divided 
into  classes,  earning  their  advancements  by  good 
marks.  "  The  majority  of  persons,"  we  are  told,  "  earn 
the  maximum  of  marks  and  secure  their  promotion 
within  the  shortest  period  allowed."  The  third  "prison" 
is  in  fact  no  prison,  but  an  open  farm,  where  there  is 
neither  bolt  nor  bar  to  prevent  their  escape,  the  deten 
tion  being  simply  that  of  moral  influence.  Yet  during 
the  twenty  years  in  which  this  experiment  has  been 


232  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

tried,  not  more  than  a  dozen  escapes  have  been  made. 
Lusk,  is,  in  fact,  an  intermediate  halting-place,  where 
the  men  have  an  opportunity  to  test  the  value  of  the 
moral  and  other  teachings  which  they  have  received 
during  their  confinement.  They  work  together,  or 
singly,  and  "  their  constant  thought  is  what  they  shall 
do  when  they  are  liberated,  what  wages  they  will  be 
likely  to  obtain,  how  they  can  win  honest  bread  and 
an  honorable  position."  Nor  in  these  twenty  years 
has  there  been  cause  for  a  single  complaint  from  any 
of  the  farmers  living  in  the  vicinage,  although  there  is 
neither  restraint  nor  discipline  at  Lusk  other  than  that 
maintained  over  ordinary  farm  laborers. 

We  cite  these  facts  as  proof,  if  any  is  needed,  of  the 
wisdom  and  expediency  of  appealing  to  the  more  hope 
ful  and  higher  elements  of  manhood  in  our  dealings 
with  even  the  most  degraded  of  human  beings. 

Make  treaty  with  the  ill-doer  as  with  a  fellow-creature, 
and  it  is  more  than  probable  that  he  will  stand  to  his 
agreement ;  but  treat  him  as  a  brute  and  he  will 
promptly  fulfill  your  expectations  by  acting  as  a  brute. 

We  have  referred  thus  briefly  to  these  experimental 
efforts  for  the  reform  of  the  dangerous  classes,  believ 
ing  that  Pennsylvania  is  fully  aroused  to  the  necessity 
of  such  efforts,  and,  through  her  legislature,  is  prepared 
to  take  a  leading  part  in  them.  That  the  necessity  is 
urgent,  the  very  name  given  by  popular  consent  to  the 
class  which  we  approach  signifies,  conveying  at  once 
their  history  and  the  ominous  presage  of  their  future. 
Nor  is  it  only  in  this  country  that  the  grave  attention 
of  governments  and  of  thoughtful  men  has  been 
anxiously  directed  to  this  fatal  element  in  the  body 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  233 

politic.  The  International  Prison  Reform  Congress, 
although  it  had  its  inception  in  the  United  States, 
numbered,  also,  at  its  late  meeting  in  London,  delegates 
(scientific  and  learned  men, — experts  in  dealing  with 
crime,  and  philanthropists)  from  every  nation  in  Europe 
but  one,  and  from  Chili,  Brazil,  Australia,  and  India. 

Nor  need  we  wonder  at  the  startled  surprise  and 
alarm  with  which  the  world  regards  the  criminal  mem 
ber  of,  or  rather  outlaw  from,  society.  At  no  period 
in  history  has  his  existence  been  so  perilous  to  the  best 
interests  of  civilization ;  never  before  has  so  much 
education  been  given  to  him,  an  education,  however, 
abused  for  want  of  moral  truth  to  guide  or  give  it 
the  proper  direction.  The  criminal  is  no  longer  the 
brutalized  boor  of  two  centuries  ago,  whose  passions, 
needs,  and  ambitions  were  almost  wholly  animal ;  he 
wears  no  collar  of  serfdom  now,  no  ineffaceable  mark 
of  caste ;  he  lives  in  an  age  when  luxury  is  attainable 
by  the  most  ignorant,  by  means  of  money  ;  in  an  age 
when  information  is  abroad  in  the  air ;  when  the  inces 
sant  friction  of  man  against  man,  the  quick  modes  of 
transit  and  communication,  offer  opportunities  for  crime, 
and  especially  organized  crime.  To  win  money  or 
power  by  any  means  other  than  that  of  slow,  patient 
industry  is  the  temptation  that  besets  him  at  every 
turn.  Civilization  has  put  her  aids  and  appliances  into 
his  hands  without  teaching  him  how  to  use  them,  and 
they  become  murderous  weapons  ;  and  now  civilization 
demands  for  her  own  sake  what  is  to  be  done  with 
him  ?  How  is  he  to  be  tamed  and  softened  and 
brought  to  look  at  the  world  and  God  with  clear 
rational  comprehension  of  his  relations  to  both  ?  The 


234  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

time  of  his  imprisonment  is  the  only  opportunity  when 
society  can  work  her  wholesome  regenerating  will 
upon  him;  he  is  there  unable  to  avert  discipline,  be  it 
wise  or  foolish  ;  he  has  proved  the  bitterness  of  evil- 
doing,  and,  whether  remorseful  or  not,  has  learned  that 
its  wages  are  misery ;  he  has  reached,  in  short,  a  halt 
ing-place  in  his  journey,  where  he  is  forced  to  look 
upon  the  two  paths  before  him  and  to  choose  between 
them.  Instruction  or  discipline  from  society  to  the  free 
man  must  necessarily  be  infrequent,  irregular,  and 
unauthorized,  but  the  convict  is  in  the  grasp  of  society 
as  helpless  as  a  child  in  its  mother's  hands.  "  He  can 
not  choose  but  hear."  The  period  of  his  imprisonment 
is  the  golden  opportunity,  therefore,  to  supply  him  with 
the  moral  truths  which  are  lacking  in  his  training :  to 
teach  him,  through  his  daily  habits,  by  the  very  neces 
sities  of  his  body  for  food  and  warmth,  that  labor — 
steady,  faithful  labor — is  the  only  means  by  which  com 
fort  can  be  made  certain  and  the  respect  of  his  fellow- 
man  insured. 

To  this  end  we  would  strenuously  urge  that  pro 
ductive  labor  should  be  made  sure  and  constant  in 
every  prison  as  a  positive  reformatory  measure,  and 
that  the  criminal  shall  be  taught  to  regard  it  as  a  relief 
and  a  reward  for  meritorious  conduct,  rather  than  as  a 
compulsory  infliction  ;  that  the  prisoner  be  taught  some 
trade  or  handicraft  (if  he  have  not  already  skill  in  one), 
in  order  to  qualify  him  for  gaining  on  his  discharge  an 
honest  livelihood ;  and,  also,  that  he  be  given  as  far  as 
practicable  the  elements  of  practical  learning,  accom 
panied  always  with  such  moral  and  religious  instruction 
as  shall  give  vital  power  to  all  knowledge. 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  235 

In  conjunction  with  this  general  scheme  of  training, 
that  the  treatment  of  each  convict  in  detail  should 
appeal  to  his  higher  rather  than  his  lower  nature,  and 
develop  the  saving  principles  of  self-respect  and  the 
recognition  of  a  constant  overruling  power. 

The  proceeds  of  the  labor  of  the  convict  to  be  used 
first  to  defray  the  expenses  of  the  state  on  his  behalf. 
In  the  New  England  States,  where  the  contract  system 
is  generally  used,  the  excess  of  earnings  of  the  con 
victs  over  their  expenses  was  $39,000,  in  1871,  Massa 
chusetts  reporting  an  annual  excess  ranging  as  high  as 
$20,000  per  annum.  In  Ohio  the  excess  amounts  to 
$40,000  per  annum.  When  such  gains  as  these  are 
attainable,  while  the  price  ^\&  per  capita  for  contract 
labor  is  but  from  fifty  to  eighty  cents  a  day,  there 
would  be,  it  is  reasonable  to  conclude,  a  much  larger 
surplusage  if  the  prisoners  were  working  with  the 
knowledge  that  they  were  themselves  to  be  the  gainers 
by  their  industry.  After  the  indemnity  of  the  state 
from  their  earnings,  we  therefore  suggest  and  respect 
fully  urge  that  the  remaining  sum  be  appropriated— 

1 .  To  the  convict's  family,  if  such  aid  be  necessary. 

2.  To  form  a  sum  in  reserve  for  the  use  of  the  con 
vict  himself  on  his  discharge.     Many  discharged  pris 
oners  are  tempted  to  crime  from  the  lack  of  means  to 
support  life  until  they  can  obtain  work.     It  is  almost 
impossible  (with  the  prison  ban  upon  him)  for  the  dis 
charged  prisoner  to  find  employment,  and  he  is  driven 
to  steal  by  the  actual  necessity  for  food.     The  surplus 
of  his  own  earnings  would  be  a  sure  preventive  of  this 


236  PJtISOJV  ECONOMY. 

immediate  peril.  Nor  do  we  perceive  the  justice  of 
applying  the  product  of  the  convict's  labor  to  the 
service  of  the  state,  beyond  the  sum  which  indemnifies 
it  for  his  maintenance.  The  punishment  inflicted  on 
him  for  his  misdemeanor  is  imprisonment  for  a  stated 
time  and  such  hardships  of  lodging,  fare,  &c.,  as  may 
be  deemed  suitable.  To  appropriate  his  earnings 
during  that  time  (beyond  the  sum  requisite  for  his 
maintenance)  is  to  impose  a  fine  upon  him,  in  addition 
to  the  punishment  of  the  body, — a  fine  not  contem 
plated  by  law  or  embraced  in  his  sentence. 

Changes  in  the  primitive  and  remedial  systems  such 
as  we  suggest  are  of  necessity  dependent  upon  you 
for  execution,  and  once  enforced  will  directly  affect  the 
condition  of  the  convict  without  influence  from  the 
agents  who  are  deputed  to  enforce  them.  But  there 
is  much  of  the  treatment  of  the  criminal,  the  mental 
and  moral  regimen  which  he  shall  receive  from  day  to 
day,  which  depends  wholly  on  the  character,  convic 
tions,  or  even  mood  of  his  keeper.  Laws  devised 
with  the  profoundest  knowledge  of  human  nature  and 
the  broadest  humanity,  and  schemes  tempered  with  the 
tenderest  chanty,  can  be  converted  into  cruelty  by  an 
unjust,  vindictive,  or  even  coarse  jailor.  Greater  care 
should  therefore  be  exercised  in  the  choice  of  these 
officials  ;  a  certain  standard  of  culture  and  moral  attain 
ment  should  be  established  by  which  their  fitness  for 
their  duties  may  be  measured. 

Political  usefulness,  popularity,  or  brute  strength 
are  scarcely  to  be  regarded  as  qualifications  for  the 
post  of  guardians  over  hospitals  filled  with  the  men 
tally  and  morally  unsound, — invalids  whose  ailments 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  237 

are  of  the  soul,  and  which  require  even  wiser  and  more 
skillful  and  humane  treatment  than  those  of  the  body. 

The  appointment  of  women  of  discreet  and  cultured 
minds  as  visitors  and  supervisors  of  the  female  wards 
of  our  prisons,  jails,  and  reformatory  schools  would,  as 
we  believe,  tend  much  to  their  improvement.  We  do 
not  conceive  that  this  point  requires  argument  other 
than  those  which  will  readily  suggest  themselves  to 
every  thoughtful  mind. 

The  tenderness  of  nature,  the  intuitive  sense  of  jus 
tice  and  fitness  which  characterize  women,  qualify  them 
to  detect  disorder  and  discrepancies  in  the  administra 
tion  of  any  scheme  of  reform,  while  a  certain  tact  and 
gentleness  of  expression  enable  them  to  approach  the 
weak  and  erring  with  peculiar  success.  We  owe  our 
own  improved  method  of  dealing  with  crime  and  in 
sanity  largely  to  the  counsel  and  suggestion  of  one 
good  woman,  and  there  are  many  others  employed  in 
practical  work  of  prison  reform  in  Europe  with  the 
most  positive  and  enduring  effect.  There  are  many 
questions  concerning  the  control  and  treatment  of 
women  prisoners,  of  which  inspectors  of  an  opposite 
sex  can  take  but  superficial  view  and  incomplete  cog 
nizance.  It  is  conceded  that  the  prisoners  should  be 
under  the  management  of  a  matron,  and  if  it  be  proper 
that  such  control  be  accorded  to  women  of  inferior 
mental  status,  it  is  assuredly  just  and  proper  that  the 
supervision  of  their  labors  should  be  placed  in  the 
hands  of  women  of  high  character  for  intelligence  and 
humanity. 

We  would  call  your  attention,  finally,  to  the  success 
ful  labors  of  the  Prison  Reform  Association,  which  had 


238  PRISON  E  CONOMY. 

its  birth  in  this  country,  although  greater  progress  has 
been  made  in  foreign  countries  in  the  wise  and  humane 
treatment  of  crime  and  pauperism  than  in  the  United 
States,  and  a  larger  amount  of  research  and  practical 
experiment  have  there  been  brought  to  bear  on  these 
difficult  problems. 

The  formation  of  this  association,  for  whose  exist 
ence  and  development  all  praise  is  due  to  Dr.  E.  C. 
Wines,  was  the  first  step  towards  concentrating  these 
separate  discoveries  and  researches,  giving  them  a 
world-wide  publicity,  and,  by  the  force  of  union,  en 
dowing  these  hitherto  scattered  efforts  of  a  few  philan 
thropists  with  the  dignity  of  a  science  and  the  authority 
and  power  of  an  international  movement. 

The  conventions  in  London,  Cincinnati,  Baltimore, 
and  St.  Louis  included  men  (eminent  for  their  philan 
thropy)  of  widely-differing  nationalities.  The  majority 
of  members,  too,  were  men  employed  for  years  in  the 
management  and  supervision  of  prisons  or  institutions 
of  reform,  and  the  controllers  of  widely-extended 
schemes  for  the  amelioration  of  the  extreme  conditions 
of  humanity,  whether  those  conditions  be  induced  by 
crime  or  poverty. 

The  association,  therefore,  brings  to  the  elucidation 
of  these  problems  not  only  the  most  earnest,  almost 
religious  enthusiasm  of  the  work  of  rehabilitating  their 
fallen  brethren,  but  a  clear  and  long-tested  knowledge 
of  the  most  practical  methods  of  accomplishing  this 
work  in  both  its  outline  and  detail. 

The  reformatory  scheme  of  work  proposed  by  the 
members  of  this  International  Congress  is,  briefly : — 
"  Penal  laws  and  institutions  to  be  brought  into  fuller 
accord  with  reason  and  humanity. 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  239 

"  Police  systems  to  be  rendered  so  efficient  that  few 
criminals  can  escape  detection  and  punishment. 

"Crime  capitalists  to  be  hunted,  dispersed,  and 
crushed.  Preventive  agencies  to  be  made  so  compre 
hensive  and  perfect  as  greatly  to  diminish  the  number 
of  criminals. 

"  The  mass  of  adult  criminals  to  be  brought  to  a 
healthier  condition  of  mind  and  habit,  and  restored  to 
the  walks  of  useful  industry."* 

The  association  is,  however,  a  council,  not  an  execu 
tive  body ;  a  parliament  without  constituencies,  unless 
we  call  such  the  weak  and  degraded  of  mankind,  for 
whom  it  labors. 

It  can  design  and  submit  schemes  of  reform,  but  it 
remains  for  the  governments  of  countries  and  of  states 
to  make  them  of  practical  benefit.  The  results  of  the 
conferences  of  this  association  are  already  apparent  in 
many  European  states.  In  Switzerland,  the  congress 
in  London  aroused  public  attention  to  penal  reform 
and  effected  a  change  in  the  constitution  by  which 
capital  and  corporal  punishments  were  abolished. 

A  house  of  correction,  a  society  for  the  care  of  dis 
charged  prisoners,  an  asylum  for  neglected  and  vicious 
children  have  been  introduced  in  different  cantons, 
while,  in  two,  a  modification  of  the  Crofton  plan  has 
been  adopted  in  their  penitentiaries. 

In  Sweden  radical  changes  in  the  penitentiary  sys 
tem  have  been  made  in  accordance  with  the  advanced 
views  of  the  congress. 

Discharged  prisoners'  associations  have  been  formed, 
and  two  reformatory  schools  founded,  modeled  after 


*  Prison  Congress,  St.  Louis,  page  44. 


240  PRISON  ECONOMY. 

the  admirable  institution  at  Mettray.  To  these  last 
the  royal  family  and  nobility  have  contributed  liberally. 

In  Italy  an  institution  for  the  education  of  prison 
officers  has  been  founded. 

It  was  to  his  school  for  prison  officers,  it  will  be 
remembered,  that  Demetz  owed  his  signal  success  in 
the  reform  of  criminals. 

In  Holland  a  modification  of  the  cellular  system  and 
other  progressive  measures  of  reform  are  now  before 
the  legislature. 

In  France  an  earnest  interest  in  penal  and  prevent 
ive  reform  has  been  awakened  by  the  congress. 

Throughout  the  civilized  world  attention  has  been 
aroused  and  the  minds  of  sincere,  practical,  and  thought 
ful  men  turned  towards  the  most  vital  of  all  the  prob 
lems  which  affect  the  well-being  of  humanity. 

In  the  United  States,  where  the  movement  origi 
nated  (but  which,  as  we  have  said,  lags  behind  several 
other  nations  in  her  application  of  the  best  modes  of 
reform),  the  endeavor  of  the  association  is  at  present 
to  secure  the  erection  of  a  national  prison,  to  which 
shall  be  removed  the  convicts  sentenced  by  United 
States  courts,  and  where  the  association  will  be  en 
abled  to  illustrate  the  highest  and  most  successful  sys 
tem.  Such  a  prison  would  offer  an  example  which 
would  doubtless  be  speedily  imitated  by  the  several 
States  and  by  other  governments. 

It  is  in  accordance  with  the  general  progressive 
movement  in  this  reform  throughout  the  world  that  we 
address  you  on  the  subject  of  the  aid  you  have  here 
tofore  extended  to  the  reformatory  and  other  chari 
table  institutions  of  the  Commonwealth.  Pennsylvania, 


PRISON  ECONOMY.  241 

through  her  late  Constitutional  Convention,  has  taken 
a  retrogade  step  in  this  matter.  The  whole  of  her  re 
formatory  and  charitable  institutions,  with  the  excep 
tion  of  the  Eastern  and  Western  Penitentiaries  and  the 
State  Lunatic  Hospitals  at  Harrisburgand  Danville,  are 
deprived  of  State  aid  unless  it  is  given  to  them  by  a 
two-thirds  vote  of  your  houses.  We  appeal  to  you  to 
support  them  liberally  as  heretofore ;  an  appeal  which 
we  have  little  doubt  will  prove  effectual.  When  nations 
which  we  have  been  accustomed  to  regard  as  but  half- 
civilized  urge  the  movement  of  reform,  Pennsylvania 
will  assuredly  not  resign  herself  passively  to  the  gov 
ernment  of  the  already  encroaching  forces  of  ignor 
ance  and  crime. 

We  here  present  a  descriptive  table  of  the  number 
of  the  several  classes  of  "  criminals "  in  the  State. 
The  statement  may  be  relied  upon  as  accurate : — 

POPULATION    OF    THE    CRIMINAL    CLASSES. 

The  estimated  population  of  the  State  on  September 
3Oth,  1874,  is  three  million  eight  hundred  and  twenty- 
one  thousand  seven  hundred  and  fifty-seven,  and  the 
following  statement  will  exhibit  the  number  of  convicts 
in  the  penitentiaries,  Allegheny  county  workhouse,  and 
county  jails  or  prisons  ;  the  number  of  persons  under 
sentence  of  justices  of  peace;  number  awaiting  trial 
and  otherwise  in  prison  on  September  jOth,  1874,  the 
aggregate  forming  part  of  the  above-estimated  popu 
lation  : — 


242 


PRISON  ECONOMY. 


Males. 

Females. 

Total. 

Aggregate. 

Convicts  —  In  State  penitentiaries,  . 

!>°53 

IO 

1,063 

•     • 

Workhouses,    .... 

134 

9 

143 

.     .     . 

County  jails,    .... 

787 

90 

877 

.     .     . 

Total  of  convicts,     

2,083 

Otherwise  in  prison  —  In  county  jails  for  payment 

of  fines  and  costs,  &c.,     

67 

Summarily  convicted  —  In  county  jails,  under  sen 

tence  of  justices  of  peace,       

24? 

In    workhouse,    under   sentence    of  justices    of 

peace. 

354 

.      .      . 

In  house  of  correction,  under  sentence  of  jus 


tices  of  peace, 


Total  summarily  convicted, 
Awaiting  trial  in  county  jails, 


Total  in  prison  September  3oth,  1874,    . 


593 


1,190 
449 


3.789 


As  above  stated,  the  number  of  convicts  in  the  peni 
tentiaries,  workhouses,  and  county  jails  on  September 
3Oth,  1874,  was  2083,  or  one  to  1835  °f  tne  population; 
67  were  in  county  prisons  under  sentence  of  court  for 
payment  of  fine  and  costs,  &c.  ;  these  can  hardly  be 
considered  as  convicts,  and  are  not,  therefore,  included 
with  them;  1190  were  in  prison,  summarily  convicted 
under  sentence  of  magistrate  or  justices  of  peace,  for 
disorderly  conduct,  breaches  of  peace,  &c.  The  num 
ber  awaiting  trial  on  September  3Oth,  1874,  was  449. 

As  the  most  powerful  and  direct  method  of  combat 
ing  these  forces  in  society,  we  entreat  your  brief  con 
sideration  of  the  subject  of  neglected  and  destitute 
children.  (See  Education,  page  76.) 


LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF 

CALIFORNIA. 

CARE    OF   THE    INSANE 


INSANE  HOSPITALS. 

GENERAL    REMARKS. 

WE  have  shown,  in  a  previous  report,  the  "census  ' 
statistics  of  the  insane  in  each  county  of  the  State,  the 
total  number  in  1870  being  stated  at  three  thousand 
eight  hundred  and  ninety-five ;  the  ratio,  one  insane  to 
nine  hundred  and  four  inhabitants.  This  enumeration, 
indeed,  is  not  accurate — the  fact  being  sufficiently 
proved  by  the  impossible  discrepancy  which  appears 
in  a  comparison  of  the  several  counties — the  ratio 
varying  from  one  in  two  thousand  to  one  in  twelve 
thousand,  in  places  where  there  are  no  asylums  for 
their  reception.  The  general  ratio  is,  of  course,  re 
duced  by  computing  the  insane  in  asylums,  hospitals, 
&c.  But  erroneous  as  the  statement  is,  falling  short 
of  the  reality,  it  is  sufficiently  suggestive.  It  manifests 
the  unhappy  fact  that  the  State  makes  provision  for 
about  one-fourth  only  of  these  hapless  wards — to 
which,  if  we  add  the  number  cared  for  in  incorporated 
or  private  hospitals,  it  will  appear  that  at  least  five- 
eighths  of  these  are  in  almshouses,  or  uncared  for  in 
any  institution  whatever.  What  the  condition  of  the 

(243) 


244  CARE    OF   THE  INSANE. 

insane  is,  as  a  general  rule,  in  the  poor-houses  of  the 
State,  we  set  forth  clearly  in  our  earliest  report ;  and 
although  there  has  been  since  then  a  manifest  improve 
ment  in  their  condition  and  treatment,  in  several  of 
the  county  establishments,  it  is  impossible,  from  the 
circumstances  which  characterize  the  whole  arrange 
ment,  discipline,  and  government  of  such  institutions, 
that  these  invalids  can  be  otherwise  than  grossly 
neglected  and  foully  wronged  ;  for  at  the  best  they  are 
merely  confined  in  places  of  detention,  under  the 
guardianship  of  a  respectable  overseer,  who  is  wholly 
ignorant  of  their  disease,  and  of  the  means  necessary 
for  its  alleviation  or  its  cure.  We  say,  at  the  best.  We 
hesitate  to  describe  the  reverse  of  the  picture.  It 
would  exhibit  a  scene  of  as  cheerless  and  uncomforted 
misery  as  the  most  bitter  misanthrope  could  desire  to 
look  upon.  It  is  hardly  fair  to  claim  that  we  have 
passed  beyond  the  ignorance  and  barbarity  of  the 
middle  ages,  in  our  consideration  and  care  of  this  class 
of  unfortunates,  so  long  as  we  suffer  the  glaring  abuses 
which  are  prevalent  in  our  midst  to  continue  unre- 
dressed. 

It  is  inconceivable  to  every  reflecting  mind,  that 
abuses  can  be  heaped  upon  the  defenseless  victims  of 
this  saddest  of  disorders,  who  should  rather  be  the  ob 
jects  of  the  most  spontaneous  sympathy,  and  the  most 
willing  kindness  and  consideration.  The  fact  that  the 
chances  of  exposure  are  too  remote  to  be  estimated, 
and,  as  in  the  case  of  the  child  and  the  brute,  that  re 
sistance  is  impossible,  no  doubt  gives  impunity  to  the 
foul  wrong-doing  which  the  insane  frequently  suffer. 
But  the  most  fruitful  cause  of  this  evil  is  the  incompe- 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  245 

tency  of  those  who  are  set  over  them.  It  is  an  evil 
almost  irremediable,  under  the  present  system  of  ap 
pointments  in  the  county  almshouses.  It  generally 
happens  that  these  are  based  solely  upon  political  con 
siderations.  Some  useful  partisan  must  be  rewarded, 
or  in  some  way  helped,  and  he  is  given  an  office,  the 
duties  of  which  he  feels  in  no  wise  called  upon  to  dis 
charge  ;  having  earned  its  perquisites  by  political  ser 
vices  before  he  received  it,  and  feeling  his  position 
secure,  he  is  quite  naturally  led  to  neglect  his  trust,  by 
ignoring  its  most  essential  requirements.  Unfitness 
of  the  highest  measure  is  the  character  of  such  ap 
pointments  generally  ;  and  the  victims  in  this  case  are 
a  class  of  defenseless  invalids,  whose  circumstances 
appeal  with  especial  urgency  to  every  sentiment  of  hu 
manity  and  justice.  This  mode  of  appointment  should 
be  abolished,  rather  than  extended,  and  we  earnestly 
invoke  the  action  of  your  honorable  bodies  to  revoke 
all  legislation  which  favors  it.  The  institutions  estab 
lished  by  the  State  and  the  counties  at  so  great  a  cost, 
and  supported  from  year  to  year  by  large  expenditure 
of  the  public  funds,  extracted  often  by  onerous  taxa 
tion,  should  be  managed  after  a  principle  which  will 
secure  those  objects,  to  accomplish  which  they  were 
respectively  founded.  Wherever  this  does  not  obtain, 
just  so  far  have  waste  and  failure  been  realized  instead 
of  gain  and  success.  This  may  not  always  be  appar 
ent  to  the  general  observation,  for  we  are  not  quick  to 
scrutinize  matters  of  this  nature ;  but  the  results  will 
not  be  questioned  if  the  premises  are  well-founded, 
and  it  needs  but  slight  investigation  to  establish  the 
verity  of  our  report  in  this  behalf.  The  same  danger 


246  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

exists,  though  much  more  remotely,  in  establishments 
specially  designed  for  the  reception'and  cure  of  the 
insane ;  and  we  consider  it  to  be  the  solemn  duty  of 
the  superintendents  of  all  institutions  for  this  class,  to 
know,  from  patient  investigation  and  inquiry  into  the 
antecedents  of  the  applicants,  that  none  are  employed 
for  nurses  or  attendants  who  are  not  adapted  to  the 
service,  by  the  characters  they  possess  for  patience  and 
forbearance  and  strict  conscientiousness.  They  should 
also  take  pains  to  instruct  them  in  their  duties,  and 
should  know  they  are  fulfilled.  We  think  that  a  clear 
responsibility  rests  upon  the  directing  head  of  every 
institution,  to  know  that  his  subordinates  fulfill  their 
proper  duties.  If  the  appointments  are  not  allowed  to 
them,  it  would  seem  that  the  danger  of  ignorance  and 
incompetency  is  greater,  and,  therefore,  closer  scrutiny 
becomes  essential.  But  superintendents  should  have 
the  authority,  at  least,  to  nominate  their  subordinates. 
They  know  better  than  others  the  requisites  for  the 
office;  and  the  responsibility  would  be  felt  and  authority 
more  readily  maintained. 

Inattention  to  these  requirements  has  subjected  in 
stitutions  of  hitherto  high  repute  to  severe  public 
odium,  not  in  our  own  but  in  other  communities,  and 
it  is  a  just  cause  for  condemnation.  We  shrink  at  the 
recital  of  occasional  cruelties  visited  upon  malefactors, 
even  where  insubordination  or  other  grievous  miscon 
duct  has  merited  punishment ;  and  philanthropy  is 
expending  itself  largely  in  contriving  schemes  of  pun 
ishment  for  crime,  by  which  the  offender  may  be 
saved  from  wanton  cruelties ;  but  for  these,  innocent 
victims  of  a  providential  dispensation, — the  chief 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  247 

causes  of  whose  mental  derangement  have  been 
"  anxieties,  domestic  griefs,  reverses  of  fortune," — the 
trust  of  the  general  public  in  the  effective  and  humane 
protection  provided  in  any  asylum  where  they  may  be 
placed,  seems  fixed  and  unwavering.  We  believe  that 
the  State  and  private  institutions  of  this  Common 
wealth  are  commendably  free  from  the  reproach  we 
have  suggested.  We  are  familiar  with  their  work 
ings.  We  know  the  direction  of  all  of  them  with 
entire  familiarity,  and  we  respect  the  earnest  humanity 
and  high  intelligence  which  characterizes  them ;  but 
we  cannot  too  firmly  impress  even  upon  these  the 
supreme  necessity  of  insisting,  for  themselves  and  for 
those  to  whom  they  owe  their  appointment,  upon  the 
employment  of  subordinates  of  every  degree  who  have 
the  ability  and  the  disposition  to  carry  out  the  instruc 
tions  which  they  receive  from  their  superiors.  The 
very  fact  that  seclusion  from  the  public  eye  is  the 
characteristic  of  these  institutions  should  be  the 
strongest  influence  with  high-minded  and  conscien 
tious  men  to  interpose  the  broadest  shield  of  gentle 
ness  and  humanity  between  their  wards  and  the 
slightest  injustice.  Insanity  should  have  a  better  and 
a  truer  name  than  madness.  To  "mistake  ideas  for 
truths  "  does  not  mean  so  much  as  this  ;  and  although 
such  perversion  not  infrequently  influences  the  patient 
to  dangerous  violence,  it  is  equally  true  that  this  irri 
tation  may  be  tranquilized  and  subdued  by  quiet,  firm, 
judicious  gentleness.  Scarcely  any  are  wholly  insane. 
There  exists  somewhere,  and  almost  invariably,  a  phase 
of  their  intellect  which  is  not  clouded,  and  their  delu 
sions  do  not  even  unfit  them  always  for  the  ordinary 
duties  of  life. 


248  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

We  think  we  have  a  right  to  present  this  class  of  de 
fectives  in  a  favorable  light.  The  general  view  exposes 
them  unfairly  to  the  public  eye ;  and  that  eye  is  too 
well  satisfied  to  look  complacently  upon  the  house  of 
detention  in  which  they  reside  as  the  summum  bonum 
for  all  their  needs.  Houses  of  detention,  simply  as 
such,  misrepresent  the  real  demand  of  an  enlightened 
public  mind,  in  relation  to  all  classes  of  unfortunates. 
They  ignore  the  principle  of  the  dignity  of  the  human 
person,  which  should  govern  the  consideration  of  these 
classes.  This  discrimination  is  lost  whenever  the 
thought  prevails  that  the  chief  good  to  be  attained  is 
to  restrain — to  save  the  public,  in  some  sort,  from  in 
convenience  or  damage  or  depredation.  This  should 
surely  be  looked  after  and  secured  ;  but  its  complete 
attainment  may  be  better  accomplished  by  considering, 
at  the  same  time,  the  duty  of  humanity  in  the  care  and 
custody  of  every  class  of  defectives.  There  are  noble 
examples  and  exponents  of  this  theory,  in  this  age,  in 
all  parts  of  the  civilized  world,  and  nowhere  more  de 
voted  to  its  realization  than  in  our  own  country  and  in 
our  own  State  ;  and  we  believe  that  a  very  large  num 
ber  of  the  insane  in  this  Commonwealth  are  not  only 
skillfully,  but  tenderly  treated.  But  this  is  not  so  in 
many  of  the  county  poor-houses.  They  have  neither 
the  accommodations  nor  the  medical  care  which  are 
suited  to  their  wants.  They  are,  for  the  most  part, 
wholly  uncared  for.  Beyond  the  mere  provision  of 
sustenance,  often  unfit  and  insufficient,  they  are  kept 
immured  in  cells  (sometimes  naked  and  often  in  in 
describable  filthiness),  or  tied  to  their  cots,  or  intimi 
dated  by  fear  of  punishment,  to  save  the  trouble  and 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  249 

expense  of  adequate  oversight.  They  are  in  the  hands 
of  attendants  as  unfit  to  minister  to  them  as  they  would 
be  to  govern  a  vessel  in  a  hurricane  ;  and  so  they  are 
stranded  or  wrecked  for  want  of  good  and  skillful  man 
agement.  The  condition  of  such  as  these  is  little  bet 
ter  than  the  sad  lot  of  the  same  class  whose  misfortune 
it  was  to  exist  during  what  we  call  the  "  middle  ages"  ; 
and,  indeed,  to  the  time  when  Pinel  set  the  splendid 
example  of  liberating  from  mechanical  restraints  the 
inmates  of  the  Bicetre  hospital,  at  Paris, — one  of  whom 
had  been  in  chains  for  forty  years, — and  which  was  the 
first  great  step  in  the  amelioration  of  the  condition  of 
the  insane.  But  are  not  the  ignorance  and  stolidity 
and  want  of  principle  which  so  often  characterize  the 
attendants  who  now  have  charge  of  the  insane,  or  per 
haps  their  inaptitude  and  inexperience,  practically 
equivalent  to  the  barbarous  practices  of  the  same  class 
who  were  their  custodians  in  the  dark  ages  ?  It  is  true 
they  are  not  now  "  chained  in  the  lowest  dungeons," 
but  they  are  confined,  and  often  bound,  in  loathsome 
rooms.  They  are  not  "  systematically  beaten  with  the 
lash,  by  direction  of  the  most  approved  authorities," 
but  they  are  often  punished  by  a  process  much  more 
painful  and  fatal,  and  frequently  upon  the  slightest 
provocation.  They  are  not  "  exhibited  for  money,  like 
wild  beasts,"  but  they  are  brought  forth  from  their 
beds  at  midnight  to  dance  and  make  grotesque  dis 
plays  for  the  entertainment  of  the  guests  of  their  cus 
todians.  They  are  even  statedly  assembled,  once  a 
week,  to  amuse  the  public  at  a  maniac's  ball. 

The  following  case  will  stand  for  one  of  many  similar 
performances    at   county  poor-houses ;   and,  as   recent 


250  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

testimony  proves,  in  establishments  of  higher  preten 
sions.  It  is  the  case  of  a  maniac,  whose  condition 
there  was  so  alarming"  that  his  removal  to  an  insane 
hospital  was  ordered.  The  physician  of  the  latter 
institution  states  that  the  patient  was  brought  to  the 
hospital  in  a  cart,  with  his  limbs  restrained.  He  was 
feeble,  but  greatly  excited.  His  condition  at  the  time 
of  admission  was  so  distressed  that  the  usual  practice 
of  bathing  and  re-clothing  was  dispensed  with,  and, 
after  administering  a  sedative,  he  was  put  to  bed.  As 
soon  as  it  could  be  done,  an  examination  was  made, 
and  numerous  injuries  to  his  person  were  apparent ; 
but  his  exhaustion  increased,  and  it  was  impossible  to 
ascertain  the  whole  extent  of  his  injuries.  On  the 
eighth  day  the  patient  died,  when  an  autopsy  was 
made,  and  the  sternum  and  nine  ribs  were  found  to  be 
broken  ;  accumulations  of  pus  were  discovered  in  va 
rious  places,  and  extensive  bruises  of  the  most  serious 
nature.  Such  was  the  condition  of  this  insane  man, 
poor,  perhaps,  and  friendless,  but,  nevertheless,  a  man 
and  a  citizen,  when  transferred  from  an  almshouse  to 
a  State  hospital. 

We  cannot  better  express  our  own  opinions  on  this 
theme  than  by  quoting  the  strictures  of  a  journalist 
upon  recent  abuses,  fully  proved  in  a  neighboring 
institution: — "One  of  the  noblest  results  of  civili 
zation  has  undoubtedly  been  the  care  and  protection 
extended  to  the  insane.  There  is  something  so  touch 
ing  in  the  spectacle  of  human  beings  deprived  of  their 
reason  that  every  one  of  right  feeling  must  extend  to 
them  the  deepest  sympathy.  This  sympathy  brought 
about  the  establishment  of  hospitals  where  the  insane 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  251 

could  be  properly  cared  for  and  sheltered  from  the 
dangers  that  beset  them.  It  was  hoped  that  through 
the  instrumentality  of  these  institutions  these  unfor 
tunates  would  escape  the  neglect  and  brutality  to 
which  they  were  exposed.  This,  at  least,  has  been  the 
popular  idea  in  connection  with  the  guardianship  of  the 
insane  ^provided  for  by  the  public.  But,  however 
humane  may  be  the  intention  of  the  community  in 
creating  these  refuges,  the  brutality  of  the  persons 
selected  as  'attendants'  entirely  neutralizes  the  benevo 
lent  motive  and  turns  them  into  places  of  torture, 
from  which  death  is  looked  on  as  a  welcome  release  by 
the  sufferers.  It  would  be  idle  to  waste  words  on  the 
brutes  in  the  shape  of  men,  who  are  capable  of  inflict 
ing  torture  and  suffering  on  their  fellow-creatures.  So 
long  as  the  present  vicious  system  is  continued,  the 
abuses  will  go  on  unchecked ;  and  it  is  only  when 
some  act  of  cruelty  has  been  followed  by  fatal  results 
that  public  attention  will  be  directed  from  the  whirl  of 
business  and  politics  and  for  the  moment  visit  the 
offense  with  a  generous  indignation." 

It  is  a  matter  of  history  that  even  Egypt  of  old  knew 
and  fulfilled  her  duty  better  towards  these  unfortunates, 
and  that  her  "priests"  provided  faithfully  for  their 
comfort  and  enjoyment.  Music,  games,  and  recrea 
tions, — in  short,  whatever  modern  ingenuity  has  devised 
to  charm  the  diseased  mind,  was  in  vogue  in  this 
''earlier  age."  And  in  ancient  Greece  one  of  the 
most  distinguished  alienists  recommended  that  bodily 
restraint  should  be  avoided ;  that  none  but  the  most 
violent  should  be  restrained. 

We  conclude  this  part  of  our  report  on  this  subject 


252  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

by  presenting  the  wise  conclusions  of  another,  which 
may  well  be  entertained  and  realized  by  those  who 
have  responsibilities  to  discharge  in  relation  to  this 
interesting  and  serious  matter:  — 

"The  patients  of  an  asylum  for  the  insane  should  be 
surrounded  by  experienced  attendants,  allowed  the 
greatest  liberty,  and  treated  with  the  utmost  amount 
of  indulgence  compatible  with  their  safety.  The  free 
use  of  their  limbs  and  abundant  exercise  in  the  open 
air  tend  to  carry  off  the  superfluous  energy  and  excite 
ment  of  the  malady.  Everything  which  can  employ 
and  interest  a  healthy  mind,  and  which  is  apart  in  its 
character  and  association  from  the  morbid  thoughts  of 
the  patient,  ought  to  be  brought  into  exercise  for  his 
recovery — judiciously  adapted  to  each  case ;  for  the 
insane  hospital  should  be  the  isolation  and  safety  of 
the  dangerous;  a  retreat  and  home  for  the  hopeless 
and  incurable ;  a  hospital  for  their  restoration  to 
mental  and  physical  health;  a  house  for  mental,  moral, 
and  physical  education ;  an  industrial  establishment, 
where  the  busy  crafts  of  artisans  and  gardeners  and 
all  the  homely  employments  which  can  occupy  the 
heads  and  hands  of  men  and  women,  are  called  into 
systematic  and  daily  activity.  Everything  should  be 
avoided  which  would  give  the  idea  of  a  prison.  They 
should  be  made  to  feel  themselves  happy  and  con 
tented  in  the  prosecution  of  some  purpose  which 
carries  their  mind  away  from  the  subject  of  their 
disease,  and  which  is  adapted  to  their  capacities,  their 
natural  tastes,  or  the  peculiar  phase  of  their  malady. 
The  qualifications  of  the  medical  superintendent — and 
every  insane  asylum  should  have  such  an  officer — are, 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  253 

indeed,  of  the  rarest  kind,  but  they  are  indispensable. 
He  must  unite  benevolence  with  firmness.  He  must 
be  good  and  humane  and,  also,  just  and  inflexible — 
courageous  and  calm,  tempering  firmness  with  severity 
and  kindness  with  decision  and  impartiality.  He  must 
have  the  tact  to  govern  others  with  ease,  to  acquire 
their  confidence  and  esteem,  and,  at  the  same  time,  to 
command  their  ready  obedience  and  respect.  Com 
bined  with  these  general  qualifications,  he  must  be 
skilled  in  his  own  profession  in  all  its  departments,  so 
as  to  give  the  advantage  of  enlightened  professional 
skill  to  the  medical  treatment  of  his  patients." 

These  requisites  seem  difficult  to  command ;  but  if 
the  natural  elements  are  not  wanting,  the  rest  may  be 
acquired.  And  the  same  principle  and  the  same  rule 
should  apply  here  which  we  have  insisted  upon  in  our 
notice  of  a  different  class  of  institutions.  Almost  the 
whole  hope  of  successful  management  of  any  one  of 
them  depends  upon  the  suitableness  of  the  directing 
head  of  the  establishment.  The  power  which  appoints 
this  officer  should  see  to  it  that  he  understands  and 
appreciates  his  work  and  its  responsibilities.  In  such 
case  there  is  small  chance  of  his  subordinates  being 
ignorant  or  neglectful  of  their  duties. 

The  law  of  commitment  to  an  insane  asylum  would 
seem  to  need  revision.  If  it  were  carried  out  accord 
ing  to  its  spirit,  it  might  be  sufficiently  protective  of  the 
rights  of  the  citizen,  of  which  it  behooves  us  to  be 
strictly  jealous.  This  law  provides  "  that  insane  per 
sons  may  be  placed  in  a  hospital  for  the  insane  by 
their  legal  guardians,  or  by  their  relatives  or  friends 
in  case  they  have  no  guardians,  but  never  without  the 


254  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

certificate  of  two  or  more  reputable  physicans,  after 
a  personal  examination,  made  within  one  week  of  the 
date  thereof,  and  this  certificate  to  be  duly  acknowl 
edged  and  sworn  to  or  affirmed  before  some  magistrate 
or  judicial  officer,  who  shall  certify  to  the  genuineness 
of  the  signature  and  to  the  respectability  of  the  signers." 

In  the  first  place,  the  medical  test  is  clearly  insuffi 
cient.  If  the  two  "  reputable  "  physicians  were  in  good 
repute  as  alienists,  there  would  be  reason  in  submitting 
to  their  judgment  the  liberty  of  a  citizen.  But  it  is 
well  known  that  insanity  is  the  most  unfamiliar  of  all 
maladies ;  that  there  is  no  chair  in  our  schools  for 
instruction  in  this  branch  of  medical  science;  that  it 
has  always  been  a  special  study,  and  that  not  one  in  a 
hundred  of  the  "reputable  physicians"  know  anything 
about  it,  which  should  entitle  them  to  the  authority 
conferred  on  them  by  the  law.  Still,  we  have  instances 
where  commitments  have  been  made  by  doctors  by 
diploma,  who  never  had  a  patient  of  any  sort  to  pre 
scribe  for,  unless  dentists  be  physicians,  or  chiropo 
dists  be  classed  with  surgeons. 

We  would  not  cater  to  the  sensational  apprehen 
sions  of  careless  thinkers  on  this  subject.  We  do  not 
believe  that  in  our  State  there  is  at  this  time  much  real 
danger,  in  this  behalf,  to  the  freedom  of  any  sane 
person ;  for  we  happen  to  be  favored  with  enlightened 
experts  in  each  of  the  important  institutions,  private 
and  public,  of  the  State,  who  would  undoubtedly  take 
means  to  redress  a  wrong  perpetrated  either  by  igno 
rance  or  design.  Still  it  is  necessary  to  provide  for 
contingencies,  and  if  the  medical  test  is  even  uncertain, 
the  importance  of  amending  it  will  be  admitted  without 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  255 

reserve,  for  the  authority  is  final  when  the  require 
ments  of  the  law  are  even  formally  complied  with,  and 
the  "  adjudged  "  lunatic  must  be  received  into  the  luna 
tic  wards. 

The  legal  examination  is  equally  unreliable.  There 
is  no  evidence  received  in  behalf  of  the  restrained 
person.  The  charge  is  almost  uniformly  taken  for 
granted,  and  the  "  lunatic  "  almost  never  seen  by  the 
magistrate.  The  reason  is  that  the  magistrate  is  quite 
unable,  of  himself,  to  pass  judgment  on  the  case,  and 
he  does  not  embarrass  himself  by  the  attempt. 

We  would,  under  these  circumstances,  recommend 
that  a  lunacy  commission,  in  each  county,  be  appointed 
by  the  officers  of  the  medical  society  in  conjunction 
with  the  superintendents  of  the  State  hospitals  for  the 
insane,  which  shall  be  substituted  for  the  "  two  reputa 
ble  physicians  "  required  by  the  present  law  ;  and  that 
the  magistrate  be  held  to  a  penalty  unless  he  complies 
literally  with  the  provisions  which  are  set  forth  for  his 
action  in  the  premises.  In  the  counties  where  medical 
societies  are  not  organized,  that  the  commissioners  be 
appointed  by  the  superintendents  alone.  In  cases  of 
sudden  and  violent  mania,  temporary  detention  in  a 
hospital  should  be  provided  for, — the  requirements  of 
the  law  to  be  complied  with  within  reasonable  time 
thereafter. 

Safe  as  we  may  fairly  regard  ourselves,  it  should  be 
our  aim  to  improve,  by  the  example  of  our  legislation 
and  our  practice  under  it,  the  insufficiency  of  what  pre 
vails  in  other  States  as  well  as  to  add  to  our  own 
security.  We  may  thus  effectually  bar  the  personal 
liberty  of  every  citizen  against  unjust  invasion. 


256  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

It  is  a  superstition  resulting  from  ignorant  credulity, 
which  takes  for  granted  every  accusation  of  lunacy,  and 
which  regards  the  disclaimer  of  the  accused  as  added 
evidence  of  his  mental  alienation. 

Provision  being  made  for  present  security,  in  ob 
vious  cases  of  mania,  it  cannot  be  denied  that  the 
doubtful  should  be  held  in  suspense  until  adequate 
judgment  be  pronounced  ;  especially  when  the  accused 
denies  the  charge  and  demands  investigation  by  an 
arbitrament  capable  of  pronouncing  an  intelligent  de 
cision.  The  most  perverted  and  chronic  criminal  can 
claim  this  right,  and  the  bare  possibility  of  mistake 
should  secure  it  for  those  whose  liberty  may  be  inno 
cently  lost. 

We  called  the  attention  of  your  honorable  bodies  to 
the  condition  of  the  insane  poor  in  the  first  words  we 
addressed  to  you. 

We  did  not  speak  in  terms  of  reproach  of  the  public 
or  the  legislature,  because  there  had  been,  until  then, 
no  official  commission,  expressly  delegated  by  your 
own  authority,  to  investigate  their  condition  and  make 
suggestions  of  amendment.  We  then  recommended 
that  the  insane  should  be  always  under  the  care  of  a 
medical  superintendent ;  that  no  recent  case  be  admit 
ted  into  an  almshouse  ;  that  the  State  hospitals  be  ade 
quately  extended  that  all  might  be  provided  for.  But 
we  are  concerned  lest  the  unwillingness  of  the  last 
legislature  to  appropriate  the  money  needed  to  com 
plete  even  so  much  of  the  hospital  for  the  insane  at 
Danville  as  would  utilize  the  expenditures  already 
made  there,  and,  what  is  more  important,  open  a  door 
for  the  reception  of  the  large  number  of  insane  de- 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  257 

-*v 

manding  admission,  indicates  a  serious  unconcern  in 
relation  to  this  class  of  unfortunates,  or  a  want  of 
appreciation  of  their  claims  upon  the  State's  attention. 
We  earnestly  renew  our  request  to  your  honorable 
bodies  to  furnish,  with  as  little  delay  as  possible,  the 
hospital  room  urgently  needed  for  the  accommodation 
of  all  the  insane  of  the  Commonwealth,  excepting  only 
those  who  are  received  into  private  hospitals,  or  cared 
for  by  the  larger  cities,  who  propose  to  provide  for  the 
insane  of  their  particular  localities. 

We  are  prepared,  upon  a  call  of  either  branch  of 
the  legislature,  to  report  upon  the  whole  subject,  stat 
ing  the  numbers  and  condition  of  this  class  ;  how  they 
are  now  circumstanced;  what  proportion  are  probably 
chronic  and  what  curable  cases ;  what  additional  ac 
commodations  are  needed,  and,  if  required,  a  scheme 
for  realizing  the  demand  which  is  made  upon  the  State 
for  the  complete  fulfillment  of  this  imperative  duty. 

It  is  a  question  with  those  who  make  the  subject  a 
particular  study,  whether  the  incurable  insane  should 
or  should  not  be  separately  provided  for,  and  many 
specialists  have  given  their  opinion  that  the  interests  of 
the  class,  as  a  whole,  would  be  better  maintained  by 
associating  them  in  general  hospitals  for  the  insane. 
It  is  not  our  intention  to  discuss  this  question  at  this 
time  ;  what  we  declare  now,  we  are  entirely  clear  about, 
namely,  that  it  is  a  reproach  to  the  boasted  liberality, 
humanity,  and  civilization  of  our  honored  State,  that 
such  of  her  unhappy  children  as  we  refer  to,  should  be 
consigned  to  the  hopeless  wretchedness  which  they 
suffer,  and  that  it  becomes  us,  without  delay,  to  apply 
an  effectual  remedy.  It  may  be  well,  in  this  connection, 


258  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

to  set  forth  the  measures  which  the  great  State  of  New 
York  has  adopted  to  relieve  this  crying  evil,  and  by 
which  it  is  certain  that  every  insane  man,  woman,  and 
child  will,  within  a  reasonable  time,  be  provided  with 
a  hospital  home,  furnished  with  every  requisite  for  its 
intelligent  administration  and  management.  The  fixed 
policy  of  that  State  is  to  separate  the  chronic  insane 
poor  from  the  recent  and  curable  cases. 

A  select  committee  of  the  senate,  appointed  for  this 
purpose,  made  report  in  1856  as  follows: — "  That  as 
insanity  is  a  disease,  which,  in  all  its  forms  and  stages 
requires  special  means  for  the  care  and  treatment  of 
its  victims,  the  policy  of  the  State  to  provide  for  their 
safety,  comfort,  and  care,  when  possible,  is  as  wise  as 
it  is  humane.  The  duty  of  the  government,  thus  to 
provide  for  its  insane,  is  acknowledged  in  all  civilized 
countries. 

"That  the  State  should  make  ample  and  suitable 
provision  for  all  its  insane  not  in  a  condition  to  reside 
in  private  families. 

"  That  no  insane  person  should  be  treated,  or  in  any 
way  taken  care  of  in  any  county  poor  or  alms  house, 
or  other  receptacle  provided  for,  or  in  which  paupers 
are  maintained  or  supported." 

It  is  a  well-established  principle  that  the  insane  can 
not  recover  amid  the  ordinary  circumstances  and 
influences  of  home,  but  they  must  be  removed  from 

familiar  associations  and  scenes  to  others  which  are 

/ 

new  and  strange  to  them.  This  disease,  instead/of 
being  a  malady  necessarily  consigning  its  victims  to 
despair  of  recovery  is,  under  favorable  circumstances, 
the  most  curable  of  diseases. 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  259 

Authorities  upon  the  statistics  of  insanity  state  the 
results  of  proper  hospital  treatment  at  about  seventy- 
five  per  cent,  of  recent  cases  in  favor  of  recovery.  It 
is  stated  in  a  memorial  to  the  legislature,  emanating 
from  high  official  authority  and  medical  experience  on 
the  subject,  that  it  may  be  expected  that  one  in  every 
one  thousand  six  hundred  and  ninety  persons  in  Penn 
sylvania  will  yearly  become  insane,  and  that  under  an 
adequate  system  of  treatment  three-fourths  of  these 
will  annually  recover,  and  the  remainder  become  hope 
lessly  incurable.  That,  in  the  absence  of  such  a  system, 
not  over  seven  per  cent,  would  recover,  and  the  re 
mainder  sink  into  hopeless  incurability.  The  perfect 
accuracy  of  the  estimate  is  not  material,  it  is  sufficiently 
correct  to  sustain  our  argument.  The  calculation  can 
be  readily  made  as  to  how  the  pecuniary  interests  of 
the  State  would  be  affected  in  the  two  cases,  and  what 
ever  modification  was  made  in  the  interests  of  the 
insane  would  proportionally  advance  the  interests  of 
the  State,  so  that  it  can  be  easily  inferred  that  the 
insane  become  a  public  burden  because  of  the  neglect 
of  timely  medical  treatment.  There  is  nothing  more 
true  than  that  the  State  or  the  county  must  pay  for  the 
support  of  the  sufferer  during  life,  unless  suitable  pro 
vision  for  cure  and  treatment  induce  timely  restoration. 
It  is,  therefore,  no  more  than  the  common  wisdom  that 
is  applied  to  the  ordinary  business  of  life,  to  take  such 
measures  as  will  give  them  the  best  opportunity  of 
restoration  that  the  age  affords. 

Assurances  such  as  these,  which  could  not  fail  to  im 
press  the  mind  of  every  intelligent  man  to  conviction, 
induced  the  New  York  Legislature  to  pass  an  act 


260  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

instituting  a  commission  to  investigate  the  condition  of 
the  insane  poor  in  the  various  poor-houses,  almshouses, 
and  insane  asylums,  and  other  institutions  where  the 
insane  are  kept.  The  condition  of  the  insane  poor  in 
the  counties  of  New  York  was,  in  a  word,  pronounced 
"  deplorable,"  and  their  report  was  the  origin  and  base 
of  what  is  called  the  Willard  asylum  for  the  insane, 
taking  its  name  from  the  author  of  the  report.  The 
law  in  reference  to  this  subject  was  passed  in  1865,  and 
its  title  declares  it  to  be  "  an  act  to  authorize  the  estab 
lishment  of  a  State  asylum  for  the  chronic  insane 
poor." 

The  intent  of  the  law  was  further  stated  to  be  the 
removal  of  every  insane  pauper  from  every  county 
poor-house  to  the  Willard  asylum,  or  to  the  State 
lunatic  hospitals, — to  the  latter  the  recent  or  curable, 
and  to  the  former  the  chronic  or  incurable  cases. 

There  has  been  no  retreat  from  this  determination 
on  the  part  of  this  great  Commonwealth ;  but  an  ex 
tensive  hospital  has  been  built  on  a  farm  of  about  five 
hundred  acres,  admirably  located  for  health  and  beauty, 
and  the  most  liberal  appropriations  have  been  con 
tinuously  made  by  the  legislature  for  the  full  develop 
ment  of  the  policy  and  intent  of  the  law,  by  which  every 
one  of  the  insane  poor  shall,  in  due  time,  be  properly 
provided  for. 

The  policy  of  separating  the  curable  from  the  chronic 
need  not  enter  into  discussion.  The  point  is,  to  furnish 
hospital  accommodations  for  this  class,  and  the  legisla 
ture  can  investigate  the  subject  through  a  separate 
commission,  or  through  the  agency  of  this  board. 
Since  the  existence  of  the  Board  of  Public  Charities  of 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  261 

the  State  of  New  York,  viz.,  since  1868,  it  has  been,  the 
organ  of  communication  with  the  legislature.  Its  last 
report  on  this  subject  declares  that  no  further  provision 
need  be  made  for  founding  a  new  insane  hospital  ;  that 
when  those  now  in  course  of  construction  are  com 
pleted,  in  accordance  with  the  plans,  provision  will  be 
secured  for  every  insane  person  in  the  Commonwealth 
of  New  York.  State  of  Pennsylvania,  go  and  do  like 
wise  ! 


PLEA  FOR  THE  INSANE. 

Insanity  in  its  relation  to  legislation  and  jurispru 
dence,  as  well  as  to  mental,  moral,  and  medical  science, 
to  its  characteristics  and  the  mode  of  determining  its 
presence,  as  well  as  the  method  of  treatment  for  its 
cure,  to  the  best  means  of  protecting  society  against 
its  violent  or  mischievous  assaults,  as  well  as  to  the 
claims  upon  our  humane  regard  and  sympathy,  is  a 
subject  of  great  difficulty,  but,  at  the  same  time,  of 
commensurate  interest  and  importance. 

It  is  not  easy  to  give  a  clear  definition  of  insanity, 
and  when  we  attempt  it,  the  danger  is  that  we  run  into 
one  extreme  or  another,  and  either  allow  none  to  be 
insane  but  the  raving  maniac,  or  make  all  insane  who 
commit  anything  foolish  or  wrong.  But  we  need  not 
attempt  a  definition  here. 

Whenever  the  condition  of  the  raving  maniac  is  so 

o 

far  approximated,  and  the  reason  so  far  disordered  or 
dethroned,  that  the  apprehension  of  the  distinction  be 
tween  right  and  wrong  is  lost,  either  wholly  and  in  all 


262  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

relations,  or  partially  and  in  relation  to  some  particular 
subjects,  then  insanity  so  far  exists  as  to  demand  to  be 
specially  recognized  by  the  administration  of  justice, 
in  the  means  to  be  provided  for  the  protection  of 
society,  and  in  determining  the  treatment  due  to  those 
who  are  its  subjects. 

The  diagnosis  of  such  cases  we  may  leave  to  ex 
perts,  and  the  determination  of  the  facts  to  the  proper 
officials,  judges,  or  juries.  We  have  nothing  here  to  do 
with  the  question  of  insanity  as  it  is  presented  to  the 
psychologist  or  to  a  petit  jury  or  to  a  commission  de 
lunatico  inquirendo,  or  to  a  board  of  medical  examiners. 
In  the  cases  to  which  we  propose  to  call  attention,  we 
assume  the  fact  of  insanity  to  be  established,  and  then, 
looking  at  the  insane  man  afterwards,  we  inquire  what 
is  to  be  done. 

But  we  must  protest,  at  the  outset,  against  a  certain 
form  of  mistaken  feeling  which,  we  suspect,  may  very 
generally  exist ;  we  refer  to  the  disposition  to  regard 
all  persons  who,  being  charged  with  crime,  are  acquit 
ted  on  the  ground  of  insanity,  as  at  least  highly  sus 
picious  characters,  to  be  classed  with  criminals  without 
reserve,  because  it  happens  that  the  greatest  criminals 
so  often  seek  to  evade  the  punishment  due  to  their 
crimes  by  setting  up  the  plea  of  insanity. 

But  this  sweeping  generalization  is  no  more  reason 
able — especially  in  the  case  of  the  poor,  who  have  no 
powerful  friends  to  work  for  them,  and  cannot  pay 
liberal  fees  for  an  elaborate  defense — than  it  would  be 
to  regard  all  men  as  criminals  and  suspicious  charac 
ters  who  are  charged  with  any  crime,  however  clearly 
their  innocence  may  be  demonstrated ;  for  this  plea  of 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  263 

insanity  is,  by  no  means,  the  pnly  plea  which  is  abused 
for  the  protection  of  knavery  and  violence. 

As  to  the  specious  modern  plea  of  moral  insanity, 
either  it  must  be  absolutely  rejected,  or,  to  be  consistent, 
all  administration  of  penal  jurisprudence  must  be  aban 
doned.  Any  insanity  that  can  be  recognized  in  law, 
must  include  a  derangement  or  loss  of  the  rational 
faculties,  and  by  such  derangement  or  loss  it  must  be 
measured.  A  "  moral  insanity  "  which  consists  merely 
in  an  abnormal  violence  of  vicious  propensities,  or  of 
some  particular  vicious  propensity,  while  yet  the  light 
of  reason  remains  unabridged,  and  the  conscious  moral 
judgment  is  clear  and  distinct,  is  only  another  expres 
sion  either  for  diabolical  wickedness,  or  for  the  ordinary 
condition  of  human  temptation. 

But,  waiving  all  such  discussions,  the  subject  which 
we  desire  to  present  to  the  practical  consideration  of 
the  legislature  is  this:  What  public  provision  should  be 
made  for  the  care  and  treatment  of  the  insane,  especially 
of  the  insane  poor,  including  those  who  have  been  con 
victed  of  crime  or  charged  with  its  commission  ? 

In  order  to  a  clear  exposition  and  apprehension  of 
the  subject  which  we  thus  desire  to  present,  it  will  be 
advisable,  and  even  necessary,  to  analyze  it,  and  to 
distribute  the  insane  into  their  several  classes,  with 
reference  to  the  end  we  have  in  view, — to  the  public 
provision  to  be  made  for  their  safe-keeping,  care,  and 
treatment.  With  this  view,  the  insane  may  be  dis 
tributed  into  three  different  classes: — 

i.  Those  who  have  done  no  violence  or  public 
harm — the  ordinary  insane.  These,  again,  fall  into 


264  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

two  sub-classes: — i.  The  harmless,  or  those  from 
whom  no  harm  is  feared.  2.  The  harmful — those 
with  manifestly  dangerous  and  destructive  propen 
sities. 

2.  Those  who    have    done    harm — have  committed 
crime — while  sane,  but  (i)  have  become  insane  before 
trial   or  conviction  ;  or  (2)  have   become  insane  after 
conviction,  — "  insane    convicts  "   in    the    strict    legal 
sense. 

3.  Those  who,  having  done  harm — having  committed 
acts  of  violence  or  mischief — have  been  acquitted  of 
crime  on  the  ground  of  insanity. 

And  first,  of  the  insane  who  have  done  no  harm. 
Among  these,  the  insanity  may  vary  in  character  and 
degree  from  some  simple  special  hallucination  down  to 
complete  dementia.  It  may  include  both  sexes  and  all 
ages ;  may  proceed  from  a  variety  of  causes,  moral 
and  physical,  may  be  recent  or  may  have  become 
chronic,  may  be  more  or  less  violent  or  dangerous,  may 
be  curable  in  various  degrees,  or  may  jfe  absolutely  in 
curable.  These  varieties  may  call  for  various  medical 
classifications  and  modifications  of  treatment,  all  of 
which  we  leave  to  medical  men  to  arrange  and  deter 
mine.  The  classification  which  more  directly  concerns 
us,  viewing  the  subject  in  its  relation  to  the  demand  for 
legislative  interposition  or  State  aid,  is — 

1.  Those  who  have  the  means  of  support,  and 

2.  Those  who  are  dependent  and  destitute. 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  265 

The  first  class  can  be  cared  for,  either  at  home  by 
their  friends,  or  at  private  asylums  established  for  the 
purpose.  The  only  occasion  for  legislative  interpo 
sition  in  their  behalf  is,  to  see  that  they  have  proper 
guardianship  to  secure  them  in  the  possession  and 
right  use  of  their  property.  And  the  only  occasion 
for  such  interposition  for  the  protection  of  the  com 
munity  in  this  regard  is,  on  the  one  hand,  to  see  that 
friends,  who  undertake  their  guardianship,  do  not 
neglect  it  to  the  peril  of  the  community,  or  abuse  it  to 
the  detriment  of  the  sufferer ;  and,  on  the  other  hand, 
to  provide  lest  by  the  criminal  collusion  or  interested 
misjudgment  of  relations  and  physicians,  any  sane  per 
son  should,  under  certain  circumstances  of  helplessness 
or  exposure,  be  condemned  to  the  living  death  of  incar 
ceration  in  some  private  hospital  for  the  insane, — a 
fate  next  in  horror  to  that  of  being  buried  alive.  As 
to  what  legislation  is  required  in  relation  to  this  class, 
we  have  only  to  refer  to  the  suggestions  presented  in 
our  last  report. 

But,  however  important  the  claims  of  this  class  may 
be  upon  the  public  consideration,  they  are  as  nothing 
in  comparison  with  those  of  the  other  class  of  the 
harmless  insane,  viz.,  the  destitute  and  dependent. 

To  these  and  their  sad  fate  we  beg  once  more, 
respectfully,  but  most  earnestly,  to  urge  the  serious 
and  special  attention  of  the  legislature.  In  our  former 
reports,  we  have  not  overlooked  the  claims  of  these 
helpless  victims  of  the  sorest  of  human  maladies ; 
but,  in  the  discharge  of  our  official  duty,  we  have 
repeatedly,  though  hitherto,  perhaps,  without  sufficient 
fullness  and  emphasis,  presented  those  claims  to  the 


266  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

consideration  of  the  legislature,  and  we  now  beg  to 
refer  to  our  former  statements  and  suggestions  on  this 
subject. 

In  our  report  for  1870: — "More  especially  do  we 
wish  to  denounce  the  cruel  wrongs  which  the  insane 
suffer  who  are  inmates  of  almshouses.  These  institu 
tions  are  generally  wholly  unsuitable  for  their  care  or 
even  detention  ;  or,  if  suitable,  are  presided  over  by 
persons  who  are  entirely  ignorant  of  the  needs  of  this 
class  of  the  sick  and  infirm,  and  whose  administration 
is  based  on  the  crudest  ideas  of  mental  disease  ;  it  is 
limited  to  the  discovery  of  the  most  available  methods 
of  preventing  them  from  harming  anything  or  any 
person  but  themselves.  We  could  instance  the  most 
glaring  abuses,  not  as  we  believe  intentionally  inflicted, 
but  the  result  of  incapacity  and  ignorance.  The  time 
has  gone  by  when  a  disturbed  imagination  or  a  disor 
dered  intellect  should  be  held  to  have  converted  its 
human  victim  into  a  distempered  brute,  whose  home 
should  be  akin  to  the  sty  or  the  stable,  and  whose 
lightest  restraint  should  be  perpetual  incarceration 
within  the  limits  of  a  cell.  These  wrongs  demand 

o 

prompt  redress.  No  hospital  for  the  insane  should 
remain  without  the  constant  supervision  of  a  medical 
superintendent.  The  stewards  of  almshouses  are 
never  selected  from  any  consideration  of  the  needs  of 
the  insane." 

The  report  was  also  accompanied  with  the  following 
formal  resolutions  of  the  board : — 

"Resolved,  That  the  Board  of  Public  Charities,  having 
witnessed  the  evils  which  result  from  the  connection  of 
insane  asylums  with  almshouses,  and  believing  that  a 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  267 

wrong  is  done  to  the  insane  by  classing  them  with 
paupers,  hindering  the  public  from  estimating  aright 
their  claims  to  sympathy  and  remedial  treatment,  dis 
approve  of  such  an  alliance,  and  believe  that  the  best 
interests  of  this  afflicted  class  of  people  and  the  duty 
of  the  State,  concur  in  the  establishment  by  the  State, 
within  a  reasonable  time,  of  sufficient  accommodations 
for  the  maintenance  and  treatment  of  all  the  insane 
who  may  not  be  cared  for  in  private  hospitals. 

"Resolved,  That  in  the  judgment  of  the  board  all 
superintendents  of  hospitals  of  the  insane  should  be 
members  of  the  medical  profession." 

In  [871  the  following  from  our  general  agent  was 
laid  before  the  legislature  : — 

"In  some  of  our  prisons  cases  of  insanity  are  found 
which  ought  to  be  transferred  to  hospitals  established 
for  the  maintenance  and  treatment  of  this  class  of 
persons.  In  the  course  of  my  inspection  of  these 
institutions,  as  will  be  seen  by  a  reference  to  my 
report,  instances  of  this  character  have  been  noticed. 
It  occasionally  happens  that  insane  persons  have  to  be, 
at  least  temporarily,  committed  to  a  prison ;  but  few 
cases  can  arise  where  this  necessity  exists  for  any  great 
length  of  time.  If  they  have  been  arrested  for  a 
crime,  the  law  has  made  ample  provision  for  a  proper 
disposition  of  them  without  a  protracted  confinement 
in  a  county  jail,  and  the  sooner  they  are  removed  there 
from  the  better,  whether  their  incarceration  is  the 
result  of  crime  or  merely  for  the  purpose  of  safe-keep 
ing.  All  the  better  feelings  of  humanity,  as  well  as  a 
sound  philanthropy,  concur  in  this  sentiment. 

"Among    the  various    defects   in    our  poor-houses 


268  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

none  are  to  be  more  deplored  than  that  which  relates 
to  the  provision  made  for  the  insane.  Scarcely  one 
can  be  mentioned  which  is  not  deficient  in  this  partic 
ular.  The  sexes,  as  the  custom  is  in  the  other  depart 
ments,  are  frequently  allowed  to  mingle  together;  few 
have  suitable  accommodations  for  their  comfort,  and 
even  in  the  best  of  them  there  is  a  lack  of  sufficient 
attendance.  New  buildings  have  been  erected  in 
several  counties  with  a  view  to  increased  facilities  for 
the  support  of  this  class,  but  even  here,  in  some  cases, 
persons  have  been  selected  who  have  no  experience 
and  but  little  qualification  for  the  duties  to  which  they 
have  been  assigned. 

"  The  attention  which  I  have  given  to  this  grave 
subject  induces  me  to  believe  that  all  cases  of  an  acute 
character  should  be  placed  in  one  of  the  public  institu 
tions  which  have  been  established  in  the  State,  city,  or 
county,  with  a  view  to  their  treatment.  To  place  a 
recent  case  where  no  suitable  medical  treatment  or 
other  proper  attendance  can  be  had,  is  either  simply  to 
leave  it  to  nature  or  facilitate  its  passage  into  a  chronic 
condition.  To  render  an  institution  suitable  for  the 
successful  management  of  such  cases,  nearly  all  the 
means  essential  for  such  a  purpose  are  wanting.  A 
proper  construction  of  the  building,  where  a  favorable 
classification  of  the  inmates  can  be  maintained;  where 
all  the  modern  improvements  for  in-door  comforts  and 
amusements  and  out-door  exercise  and  recreation,  and 
where  competent  medical  and  other  attendance  can 
always  be  procured,  are  necessary  to  attain  the  great 
object  in  view — a  restoration  to  health  and  a  sound 
mind. 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  269 

"  For  the  most  part  all  that  can  be  expected  in  our 
county  almshouses  is  to  secure  such  provision  for  the 
chronic  and  incurable  insane  as  will  meet  the  demands 
of  a  Christian  humanity.  To  confine  them  in  close 
and  badly-ventilated  apartments,  with  scarcely  any  of 
the  comforts  which  an  enlightened  philanthropy  would 
suggest — a  condition  in  which  they  are  too  often 
found — manifests  such  a  failure  of  duty  as  to  bring 
odium  and  shame  upon  the  civilization  of  the  age. 

"  In  New  York,  a  State  institution  was  established  in 
1865,  under  the  name  of  the  Willarcl  Asylum  for  the 
Insane,  for  the  reception,  care,  and  treatment  of  the 
chronic  insane  poor,  who  were  then  provided  for  in  the 
several  county  poor-houses  in  the  State.  This  institu 
tion  is  reported  to  be  in  successful  operation.  Whether 
the  plan  of  separating  this  class  of  insane  from  the  more 
acute  and  hopeful  cases,  and  keeping  them  in  different 
institutions,  is  best  adapted  to  the  successful  treatment 
of  the  insane  population,  is  a  question  much  discussed 
among  experts  of  the  present  day.  The  medical  su 
perintendents  of  our  insane  hospitals,  after  a  full  and 
able  discussion  of  the  subject,  came  to  the  conclusion 
that  such  a  classification  would  be  detrimental  to  the 
interests  of  both  classes.  With  such  able  authority 
against  such  a  measure,  I  am  not  prepared  to  endorse 
the  action  of  the  New  York  Legislature,  but  prefer  to 
leave  the  subject  for  further  experience,  and  the  candid 
consideration  of  philanthopists." 

As  to  the  statistics  in  regard  to  this  class  of  un 
fortunates,  this  board  hereby  renews  the  offer  made 
last  year: — "We  are  prepared,  upon  a  call  of  either 
branch  of  the  legislature,  to  report  upon  the  whole 


270  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

subject,  stating  the  numbers  and  condition  of  this  class, 
how  they  are  circumstanced,  what  proportion  are  prob 
ably  chronic  and  what  curable  cases,  what  additional 
accommodations  are  needed,  and,  if  required,  a  scheme 
for  realizing  the  demand  which  is  made  upon  the  State 
for  the  complete  fulfillment  of.  this  imperative  duty." 

But  as  to  the  number  of  helpless  sufferers,  these  de 
pendent  wards  of  the  State,  we  may  say  beforehand, 
and  without  reference  to  statistics,  that,  if  the  number 
is  some  thousands,  their  moral  claim  upon  the  State,  as 
a  matter  of  simple  duty  on  her  part,  is  multiplied  so 
many  thousand  fold ;  and  if  the  number  is  small,  there 
is  the  less  excuse  for  shrinking  from  the  performance  of 
that  duty — for  making  proper  and  complete  provision 
for  the  care  and  treatment  of  them  all. 

If  these  persons  are  to  be  allowed  to  live  among  us, 
if  they  are  not  to  be  left,  some  to  starve  and  perish, 
and  others  to  spread  their  mischief  far  and  wide,  it  is 
for  the  interest  of  the  State  that  public  provision  should 
be  made  for  their  detention  and  maintenance ;  and  if 
they  are  to  be  detained  and  supported  at  the  public 
expense,  it  is  for  the  interest — the  palpable  pecuniary 
interest — of  the  State  that  they  should  have  appropri 
ate  and  comfortable  accommodations,  kind  supervision, 
and  the  most  patient  and  skillful  curative  treatment. 
This  may  be  demonstrated  in  a  few  words.  We  may 
take  two  facts  as  well  ascertained,  and  we  believe  they 
are  admitted  without  a  dissenting  voice,  first,  that  under 
care  and  skillful  treatment,  as  in  our  best  hospitals, 
about  seventy-five  per  cent,  of  recent  cases  of  insanity 
will  be  cured  in  the  first  six  or  twelve  months  ;  second, 
in  poor-houses  not  more  than  seven  per  cent,  will  be 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  271 

cured  in  the  first  year.  Assuming  these  premises,  and 
making  the  expense  of  each  patient  in  the  hospital 
twice  what  it  would  be  in  the  almshouse,  the  gain  in  the 
first  instance,  under  hospital  treatment,  is  simply  enor 
mous.  But  this  is  not  all.  There  are  likely  to  be  more 
cures  afterwards  under  the  skillful  treatment  than  under 
the  other.  But  suppose  there  were  not,  and  that  all  the 
remaining  cases  were  incurable,  there  would  remain, 
on  one  side,  ninety-three  incurables  to  be  maintained 
for  life,  and,  on  the  other,  twenty-five;  and  if  the  ratio 
of  expense  were  still  double,  the  result  would  be  in 
favor  of  hospital  treatment  as  fifty  tJ  ninety-three. 
That  is  to  say,  the  latter  method  would  be  a  continual 
saving  to  the  State  for  many  subsequent  years  of  more 
than  forty-six  per  cent,  per  annum.  Nor  is  this  all. 
It  must  be  remembered  that  the  greater  part  of  the 
insane  poor  owe  their  poverty  to  their  insanity,  and 
not  their  insanity  to  their  poverty  ;  and  that,  in  losing 
their  power  to  support  themselves,  they  have  lost,  also, 
in  a  very  large  proportion  of  cases,  the  power  to  sup 
port  families  more  or  less  numerous,  who  thus  become 
dependent  upon  the  public  for  their  maintenance.  The 
restored  maniac  resumes  not  only  the  enjoyment  of  a 
man's  consciousness  but  of  a  man's  activity — the  power 
of  self-support ;  and  not  only  of  this,  but  of  support 
ing  by  his  industry  those  dependent  upon  him  ;  and 
every  man  who,  by  his  enterprise,  skill,  and  labor,  sup 
ports  himself  and  family,  contributes  also  to  the  support 
of  other  men  and  their  families.  Such  are  the  eco 
nomical  advantages  accruing  to  the  State  from  a  proper 
treatment  of  the  insane,  poor  and  their  consequent 
restoration  to  mental  health. 


272  CARE    OF   THE  INSANE. 

But  these  unfortunate  persons  have  claims  upon  the 
State  higher  far  than  mere  considerations  of  economy. 
They  are  her  wards,  and  she  is  bound  by  the  dictates 
of  simple  justice  and  imperative  duty  to  secure  to 
them  that  humane,  watchful,  and  patient  care,  and  that 
skillful  treatment  which  will  give  the  best  promise  of 
their  speedy  restoration.  If  she  choose  to  put  them 
out  of  the  way,  like  noxious  beasts,  or  to  let  them  alone 
to  starve  and  die,  she  might  say  that  charity  and  philan 
thropy  were  no  part  of  her  mission,  and  ask  who  made 
her  their  keeper.  But  when  she  has  laid  her  hand 
upon  them,  put  them  in  places  of  restraint  and  deten 
tion,  and  taken  control  and  charge  of  them,  she  has 
made  herself  their  keeper,  and  has  bound  herself  so  to 
treat  them  as  shall  most  conduce  to  their  future  well- 
being  as  well  as  to  her  own. 

As  to  their  actual  condition  in  our  county  poor- 
houses  or  prisons,  we  do  not  propose  to  weary  the 
patience  or  offend  the  sensibilities  of  the  honorable 
members  of  the  legislature  by  the  renewed  recital  of 
the  more  than  three-times-thrice-told  tale  of  the  woes 
and  sufferings  of  this  sorely-stricken  class  of  our  fel 
low-citizens.  That  the  story,  with  all  its  touching  and 
terrible  details,  ranging  from  the  intensely  sad  to  the 
unspeakably  horrible,  should  have  been  so  often  re 
peated,  and  yet  the  evil  remain  to  so  large  a  degree 
unremediecl,  instead  of  exciting  our  impatience,  should 
rouse  our  shame,  and  provoke  us  to  immediate  and 
energetic  action.  The  story  can  never  grow  old  or 
worn,  as  long  as  the  subject-matter  itself  remains  a 
fresh  and  living  reality.  There  is  but  one  voice  in  this 
case.  No  intelligent  person  has  ever  made  a  general 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  273 

visitation  of  the  prisons  and  almshouses  of  this  State 
without  being  startled  and  almost  overwhelmed  by  the 
forlorn  and  hopeless,  and  sometimes  horrible,  condition 
of  their  insane  inmates.  Those  who  some  years  since 
made  a  similar  visitation  in  the  State  of  New  York, 
pronounced  their  condition  "deplorable,"  and  that  State 
forthwith  determined  to  apply  an  effectual  remedy. 
The  impression  made  upon  this  board  by  similar  visit 
ations  in  our  own  State,  have  been  laid  before  the 
legislature  in  our  reports  from  year  to  year.  The 
shocking  and  sickening  revelations,  so  graphically  set 
forth  in  the  memorial  of  Miss  Dix,  presented  to  the 
legislature  of  1845,  are  not  Yet  obsolete.  There  have 
been  some  improvements  since  made  in  some  of  these 
places.  In  the  Philadelphia  almshouse,  since  then, 
there  has  been  a  great  reform ;  and  in  several  other 
counties,  well-constructed  hospitals  for  the  sick  and 
insane  have  heen  built ;  but,  with  one  or  two  excep 
tions,  there  is  no  special  medical  supervision  or  paid 
attendance  at  all.  But  in  most  parts  of  the  State  that 
condition  remains  now  substantially  the  same  as  then. 
Indeed,  without  a  total  revolution  of  the  system,  it  is 
impossible  greatly  to  improve  it.  There  may  be  grave 
faults  in  the  management  in  these  poor-houses,  some 
of  which  might  be  remedied,  and  others  are  probably 
incapable  of  remedy ;  but  the  great  cause,  the  funda 
mental  cause  of  the  evil,  is  in  the  system  itself.  If  the 
administration  was  made  as  perfect  as  human  infirmity 
allows,  if  the  best  superintendents  or  wardens  and  the 
most  faithful  attendants  were  secured,  while  the  evil 
might  be  mitigated,  it  would  remain  substantially  the 
same,  until  the  system  itself  is  changed.  The  remedy 
is  not  reform,  but  revolution. 


274  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

We  take  leave  to  insert  here  the  report  made  in  the 
course  of  the  present  year  by  a  member  of  this  board, 
of  his  personal  inspection  of  one  of  our  county  poor- 
houses: — 

"  With  respect  to  the  strictly  pauper  department  of 
this  almshouse,  it  bore  a  resemblance  to  other  estab 
lishments.  There  was  a  scene  of  listless  idleness  and 
uselessness,  without  any  superintending  care.  My 
attention  was  particularly  directed  by  the  general  agent 
to  the  hospital  for  the  insane,  which  was  a  separate 
building,  upon  the  same  ground  with  the  other  depart 
ments  of  the  almshouse.  I  found  these  inmates  suffer 
ing  for  the  want  of  almost  every  attention  and  con 
sideration  which  are  necessary  to  make  life,  even  to 
the  strong  and  hardy,  tolerable.  They  have  sufficient 
food,  such  as  it  is,  at  stated  intervals,  and  the  cells  they 
occupy  are  furnished  generally  with  a  rough  bed  and 
bed-clothes.  These  cells,  too,  are  tolerably  clean,  for 
the  cleaning  of  an  establishment  such  as  this  can  be 
done  without  much  difficulty,  because  there  is  always  a 
sufficient  number  of  paupers  to  do  the  work.  Where 
the  insane  patients  are  considered  violent  or  even  dis 
agreeable,  it  often  happens  that  their  cells  are  either 
neglected,  or  forcible  measures  are  resorted  to  for  the 
purpose  of  overcoming  their  interference,  while  their 
cells  are  being  cleaned  by  the  paupers.  Though  the 
board  had  previously  called  the  attention  of  the  direct 
ors  of  this  institution  to  the  imperfect  ventilation  of 
the  insane  hospital,  I  found  that  even  the  means  avail 
able  for  correcting  the  cause  of  this  complaint  had  been 
very  imperfectly  attended  to.  The  consequence  was 
that  the  atmosphere  of  most  of  the  cells  had  become  so 


CARE    OF   THE    INSANE.  275 

vitiated  and  offensive  that  any  person  accustomed  to 
the  open  air  would  necessarily  have  fainted  upon  re 
maining  within  the  apartment  for  a  moment  of  time. 
The  inmates  seemed  to  have  become  used  to  this  nox 
ious  atmosphere,  and  they  did  not  complain  of  it.  On 
the  contrary,  the  only  complaint  on  their  part  was  that 
made  by  an  old  woman,  when  her  window  was  lowered 
a  little  to  admit  the  fresh  air. 

"The  responsibility  for  this  chronic  neglect  of  these 
classes  begins  with  the  public  and  ends  with  the  hum 
blest  attendant  of  the  institution.  So  lost  to  all  sense 
of  decency  have  the  insane  of  this  hospital  become,  by 
reason  of  the  failure  on  the  part  of  those  in  authority 
to  encourage  a  proper  appreciation  of  self-respect 
among  the  inmates,  that  their  habits  are  precisely  like 
those  of  a  brute.  Consequently  many  of  them  are 
kept  naked  in  their  cells,  from  which  they  are  drawn 
out  each  morning  to  be  cleaned  and  their  rooms  put 
in  order.  The  filthiest  part  of  the  litter — for  their 
bedding  consists  wholly  of  straw — is  then  removed 
and  its  place  supplied  with  a  similar  quantity  of  the 
fresh  material,  when  they  are  returned  to  their  disgust 
ing  dens,  there  to  pass  another  period  of  solitary 
wretchedness  in  an  atmosphere  whose  odor  exceeds 
in  offensiveness  anything  which  the  imagination  can 
conceive.  Through  the  gradual  enfeebling  of  the 

o  o  o 

higher  attributes  of  their  natures,  some  of  these  people 
come  to  be  regarded  by  the  other  inmates  as  mere 
animals,  and  the  young  girls  of  the  establishment  look 
upon  these  naked  men  simply  as  they  would  look  upon 
a  horse  or  a  hog.  I  am  told  that  frequently  two  of  the 
young  female  inmates  of  this  insane  hospital  are  called 


276  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

upon  to  clean  these  men  each  morning  as  they  are 
drawn  out  from  their  cells." 

The  following  statement  of  the  condition  of  the  in 
sane  in  another  poor-house,  is  given  on  the  well- 
sustained  authority  of  another  member  of  the  board: — 

"  In  February  last,  a  visit  was  paid  this  almshouse, 
and  an  insane  inmate  was  seen, — a  young  woman  over 
twenty  years  of  age,  whose  whole  dress  consisted  of  a 
thin  chemise  with  short  sleeves,  a  single  skirt,  and  a 
pair  of  shoes.  When  brought  before  the  visitors  a 
borrowed  cloak  was  thrown  over  her  shoulders.  She 
was  blue  with  cold  and  utterly  filthy  in  person.  Her 
cell  had  the  appearance  of  having  undergone  a  recent 
hasty  washing,  but  was  pervaded  with  an  odor  loath 
some  in  the  extreme.  On  the  day  of  this  visit  the 
thermometer  fell  to  fourteen  degrees. 

"  In  March  another  visit  was  paid  to  the  institution 
by  several  gentlemen  in  a  body.  Only  one  portion  of 
the  building  was  visited,  which  is  supposed  to  be  de 
voted  exclusively  to  women.  In  one  cell  was  a  young 
woman,  the  one  already  referred  to.  Her  cell  was 
without  any  furniture  whatever,  her  bed  consisted  of 
one  blanket,  her  clothing  a  ragged  chemise  open  to  her 
waist,  and  one  scanty  skirt  and  a  pair  of  shoes.  She 
was  indescribably  unclean,  and  alive  with  vermin.  Her 
cell  reeked  with  a  sickening  odor,  the  result  of  a  total 
absence  of  all  conveniences  of  cleanliness.  She 
shivered  with  cold,  while  in  the  presence  of  her  visitors, 
the  thermometer  standing,  at  the  time,  several  degrees 
below  the  freezing  point. 

"Opposite  to  the  cell,  which  We  have  very  faintly 
described,  was  another.  The  short  day  had  already 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  277 

faded  into  dusk,  and  as  the  light  was  thrown  through 
a  little  aperture  in  the  door,  it  fell  upon  two  wretched 
women,  both  of  whom  were  absolutely  without  a  single 
garment  to  cover  them.  One  of  the  poor  creatures 
sat  crouching-  in  the  corner  with  a  small  blanket  drawn 

o 

across  her  shoulders,  while  the  other  was  crawling  on 
all  fours  on  the  floor,  without  even  this  poor  apology 
of  any  remnant  of  human  decency !  There  was  not 
a  particle  of  furniture  in  the  cell ;  and  there,  on  this 
wintry  March  night,  in  an  atmosphere  which  the  wit 
nesses  declare  to  have  been  utterly  horrible,  were 
these  two  human  beings,  brought  down  far  below  the 
level  of  our  domestic  brutes. 

"  In  an  adjoining  cell  the  visitors  found  a  man  lying 
on  an  old  mattress,  the  only  sign  of  furniture  which 
they  saw  in  either  of  the  rooms  inspected.  They 
were  informed  that  the  inmate  was  a  woman,  but  upon 
one  of  the  gentlemen  calling  to  him,  he  sat  up,  and  it 
was  seen  that  it  was  a  man.  The  attendant,  with  some 
confusion,  explained  that  he  must  have  been  brought 
in  while  he  was  away. 

"  We  found  the  female  insane  department  in  a  shock 
ing  condition  ;  so  bad  that  it  would  be  impossible  to 
give  a  description  of  the  place  on  paper.  In  some 
cells  there  were  two  or  more  women  confined,  some 
without  any  clothing,  lying  on  the  floor  without  mat 
tress,  carpet,  or  anything  else,  except  an  old  .Govern 
ment  blanket.  The  place  had  a  horrible,  putrid  odor. 

"We  examined  one  woman  who  was  quite  young.  I 
was  afraid  to  go  near  her,  as  she  seemed  covered  with 
vermin.  We  were  all  much  shocked  by  the  visit,  and 
I  think  I  shall  remember  it  as  long  as  I  live." 


278  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

And  the  general  agent  reports  the  following  amongst 
many  similar  instances  of  abuses  and  neglect  in  the 
same  establishments  :— 

"  Insane  totally  neglected  morally,  physically,  and 
medically ;  less  attention  is  given  to  them  than  would 
be  given  to  the  lowest  animals  ;  four  are,  incapable  of 
self-care,  confined  in  filthy  cells ;  one,  a  female,  has 
great  neighborhood  notoriety,  from  sad  incidents  con 
nected  with  her  history ;  known  as  an  intelligent, 
esteemed,  and  attractive  young  lady,  the  daughter  of 
a  well-known  inhabitant  of  the  neighborhood,  she  fell 
a  victim  to  the  arts  of  the  seducer.  Insanity  is  alleged 
to  be  caused  by  her  disappointment.  This  occurred 
twenty-one  years  ago.  The  sad  case  is  rendered  still 
more  painful  by  her  present  forlorn  condition.  A  bed 
of  straw  upon  a  damp,  dirty  floor,  into  which  the  ex 
ternal  light  can  find  no  entrance,  is  the  only  furniture. 
A  seat,  a  chair,  or  a  bench,  has  apparently  never  been 
furnished ;  the  consequence  of  which  is,  that  the  mus 
cles  of  the  lower  extremities,  from  the  cramped  posi 
tion  in  which  she  was  always  found,  have  become 
permanently  contracted,  so  that  the  only  movement  of 
which  she  is  capable  is  one  similar  to  that  of  a  frog." 

"An  unusually  large  number  of  insane,  many  of 
chronic  form,  but  quite  a  number  of  strongly-marked 
cases,  who  were  confined  and  had  been  chained  to  the 
floor  until  released  by  my  direction.  A  young  girl  of 
seventeen  years  of  age,  confined  in  a  gloomy  cell, 
since  removed,  by  my  request,  to  the  State  hospital, 
where  she  is  gradually  being  restored." 

"  Twenty-two  insane,  twelve  are  kept  in  close  con 
finement,  some  in  chains ;  one  always  chained  to  the 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  279 

ceiling  to  prevent  him  from  tearing  his  clothes ;  some 
entirely  nude ;  at  least  six  with  straw  litters  ;  not  one 
of  the  twelve  was  ever  removed  into  the  open  air.  All 
confined  in  apartments  opposite  each  other,  a  narrow 
corridor  extending  between  them.  The  effect  of  this 
close  proximity  was  to  make  the  day  and  night  hideous 
with  the  distressing  shrieks  and  yells  of  the  wretched 
and  maltreated  madmen. 

"  Eight  insane,  one  of  whom  hand-cuffed,  one  hop 
pled  ;  one  female  confined  to  her  room." 

"One  hundred  and  thirty-five  inmates,  four  blind,  one 
palsied,  seven  idiots  ;  seven  cells  in  the  basement,  with 
insane  in  each,  in  a  revolting  condition." 

"  Twenty  insane  ;  of  these  about  eight  were  confined, 
not  to  their  uncomfortable  cells  only,  but  restrained  by 
iron  fetters,  long  after  the  necessity  had  passed  away. 
These  were  removed  at  my  instigation,  and  the  doors 
of  their  cells  were  opened,  to  give  them  the  benefit  of 
the  open  air  and  exercise,  with  decided  improvement 
in  their  condition." 

There  are  two  difficulties  in  the  way  of  checking 
these  and  similar  abominations :  one  is  the  unwilling 
ness  of  the  directors  of  the  poor  to  make  expenditures 
for  the  comfort  and  well-being  of  the  classes  committed 
to  their  charge.  They  employ  a  steward,  whose  prin 
cipal  requisite,  is  that  he  shall  be  a  good  farmer,  and 
whose  attention  must  be  given  mainly  to  the  farm  of 
the  institution,  which  may  be,  in  extent,  from  one  hun 
dred  to  four  hundred  acres.  As  a  consequence,  the 
care  and  supervision  of  the  human  beings  over  whom 
this  "  steward  "  is  placed  are  lost  sight  of,  to  a  great 
degree,  in  the  apparently  more  important  business  of 


280  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

the  farm,  and  are  generally  committed  to  the  oversight 
of  the  paupers  themselves.  This  is  one  evil.  The 
other  is  apparent  in  the  very  unsuitable  arrangement 
and  construction  in  which  the  most  helpless  inmates — 
we  mean  the  insane — are  placed.  In  these  structures 
it  is  a  rare  thing  to  find  the  sexes  at  all  adequately 
separated,  and,  generally,  they  have  no  airing  grounds, 
or  even  yards,  to  which  the  patients  can  repair  and 
refresh  themselves  during  the  day.  Therefore  they 
must  remain  in  seclusion  within  their  cells,  from  the 
beginning  to  the  end  of  the  year,  existing  in  an  atmos 
phere  of  great  impurity,  and  constantly  deteriorating 
in  their  mental  and  physical  condition. 

In  order  to  make  the  work  of  the  board  effective,  a 
certain  amount  of  executive  power  should  be  granted 
to  it,  as  has  recently  been  conferred  upon  the  New 
York  Board  of  Public  Charities  by  the  legislature  of 
that  State.  The  public  seem  to  be  satisfied  with  houses 
of  detention.  To  get  the  various  classes  of  unfortu 
nates  out  of  sight  seems  to  be  the  main  object.  The 
consequence  is,  that,  as  a  general  rule,  the  prison  is 
better  than  the  poor-house  as  a  receptacle  for  the 
insane. 

We  may  lay  it  down  as  a  principle,  at  length  become 
too  plain  to  be  controverted,  indeed,  as  a  point  admit 
ted  on  all  hands,  that  poor-houses  are  not,  and  cannot 
be  made,  fit  places  for  the  care  and  treatment  of  the 
insane.  That  they  may  receive  proper  treatment  with 
any  hope  of  recovery,  they  must  be  placed  in  hospitals 
or  asylums,  especially  constructed  and  fitted  up  for 
their  accommodation,  with  cheerful  scenes  within  and 
cheerful  scenery  around,  with  skilled  medical  supervi- 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  281 

sion  and  carefully  selected  and  well-trained  attendants; 
none  of  which  conditions  can  be  commanded  in,  or  in 
connection  with,  an  ordinary  county  poor-house.  In 
connection  with  so  large  an  establishment  as  the  Phila 
delphia  almshouse,  where  are  gathered  nearly  one-half 
of  all  the  pauper  population  of  the  State,  a  separate 
hospital  of  the  required  character  may  be  provided  and 
supported ;  and  we  commend  the  humane  and  earnest 
spirit  which  is  engaged  in  two  or  three  of  the  larger 
communities,  as,  for  instance,  Berks  and  Lancaster 
counties,  in  making  adequate  provision  for  their  in 
sane.  But  in  connection  with  the  smaller  almshouses 
of  the  several  counties,  and  still  more  in  connection 
with  the  township  arrangements  for  the  care  of  the 
poor,  such  separate  hospital  accommodations  are  out 
of  the  question.  They  will  never  be  established,  and, 
if  they  were,  they  could  not  be  maintained. 

It  will  naturally  be  asked  here,  whether  the  State  has 
not  already  established  one  or  more  general  hospitals 
for  the  care  of  the  insane,  with  a  view  to  meeting  this 
precise  difficulty  ?  She  has ;  and  established  them, 
professedly,  for  this  very  class  of  the  insane  whose 
case  we  are  now  considering, — for  the  insane  poor,  the 
insane  who  had  been  or  are  liable  to  be  orathered  into 

o 

the  almshouses,  or  sent  for  safe-keeping  to  the  prisons, 
in  the  several  counties.  The  State  has  established 
these  hospitals  at  no  little  expense ;  but  a  very  small 
percentage  of  the  "  poor  "  insane  are  now  in  them  ;  the 
great  mass  still  remain  in  their  former  wretched,  forlorn, 
and  hopeless  quarters,  a  spectacle  of  misery  or  a  butt 
of  derision  ;  and  an  element  of  disturbance  and  irrita 
tion  to  the  rest  of  the  inmates.  To  the  hospital  at 


282  CARE    OF   THE    INSANE. 

Harrisburg  there  were  committed  by  the  public  authori 
ties  and  courts  during  the  year  1872,  sixty-one  poor 
patients ;  and  one  hundred  and  thirty-eight  "  paying  " 
patients  were  sent  there  by  "friends."  And  of  the 
four  hundred  and  eight  remaining  on  December  3ist, 
1872,  there  were  one  hundred  and  seventy-nine  sup 
ported  by  "  public  authorities,"  and  two  hundred  and 
twenty-nine  by  "  friends  of  patients."  Again,  of  the 
one  hundred  and  sixteen  patients  committed  to  this 
hospital  during  the  nine  months  ending  September 
30 th,  1873,  eighty-four  were  "paying"  and  only  thirty- 
two  public  or  indigent  insane  patients. 

Now  it  is  manifest  from  the  memoral  of  Miss  Dix, 
in  response  to  which  the  State  hospital  was  estab 
lished,  and  by  the  express  words  of  the  law  of  1845, 
coeval  with  its  establishment,  that  the  original  design 
of  the  hospital  was  what  that  of  any  such  hospital 
ought,  in  all  reason,  to  be, — to  provide  for  the  insane 
poor. 

The  law,  section  twenty-five,  declares  that,  in  order  of 
admission  the  "poor"  shall  have  precedence  of  the 
"rich,"  defined  throughout  the  act  "paying  patients,"  and 
while  the  finances  of  the  State  do  not  permit  ample  pro 
vision  for  all  cases  of  insanity,  recent  cases  shall  have 
precedence  over  cases  of  long  standing.  If,  under  this 
law,  the  whole  capacity  of  the  hospital  were  devoted  to 
the  "  poor,"  no  objection,  perhaps,  could  be  made  to 
sending  away  the  incurable,  after  a  reasonable  period  of 
trial,  to  make  room  for  recent  cases;  although  it  does 
not  appear  that  such  was  the  intention  of  the  law, 
which  seems  to  have  merely  laid  down  a  "  rule  "  to 
govern  the  order  of  admission  to  vacancies  as  they 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  283 

should  be  found  to  exist.  But  how  should  it  happen 
that  a  majority  of  the  inmates  of  this  State  institution 
should  be  "  paying  patients  "? 

How  happens  it  that  during  the  year  1872  sixty- 
nine  per  cent,  of  the  patients  admitted  were  paying 
patients,  and  only  thirty-one  per  cent,  public  patients, 
and  of  those  admitted  during  the  nine  months  ending 
September  3Oth,  1873,  the  paying  patients  should  in 
crease  to  seventy-two  per  cent.,  with  corresponding  re 
duction  of  public  patients  to  twenty-eight  per  cent.? 
Again,  that  at  the  close  of  the  year  1872,  this  hospital 
should  be  occupied  with  fifty-five  per  cent,  of  paying 
patients,  and  at  the  end  of  September  3Oth,  1873,  with 
fifty-six  per  cent,  of  the  same  class  ? 

It  is  said  that  the  incurables  are  sent  away  to  make 
room  for  recent  cases.  But  upon  what  authority  ? 
And,  besides,  if  those  sent  to  the  hospital  by  their 
friends  are  recent  and  curable  cases,  in  a  larger  pro 
portion  than  the  others,  how  comes  it  that  a  smaller 
percentage  of  these  are  discharged  during  the  year? 
Or,  if  they  are  incurable  in  a  large  proportion  than 
those  committed  by  the  public  authorities,  why  are  they 
not  sent  away  in  still  greater  proportion  than  the 
others,  instead  of  being  discharged  in  still  less  propor 
tion  ?  Or,  rather,  why  are  they  not  all  sent  away ;  or 
rather  kept  away,  as  long  as  any  of  the  others  remain 
unprovided  for?  We  understand  that,  as  a  general 
rule,  those  committed  to  this  hospital  by  the  county 
authorities,  if  not  "  speedily  "  cured,  are  sent  back  to 
the  helpless  and  hopeless  life-doom  of  the  poor-houses. 
On  the  other  hand,  it  is  evident  that  "  paying  "  patients 
may  stay  as  long,  apparently,  as  their  comfort  and  the 


284  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

convenience  of  their  friends  require,  and  their  means 
suffice  for  their  support.  Now  we  cannot  but  regard 
all  this  as  a  gross  public  wrong.  The  State  has  erect 
ed  hospitals,  not  for  the  "rich"  but  for  the  "poor;" 
or,  for  the  rich,  only  when  the  poor  should  all  be  pro 
vided  for.  There  is  no  need,  even  if  it  were  right, 
that  the  State  should  erect  hospitals  at  the  public  ex 
pense  and  out  of  the  public  taxes,  for  the  accommoda 
tion  of  the  rich  ;  they  can  or  they  will  provide  hospitals 
for  themselves,  including  persons  of  moderate  means 
as  well  as  of  considerable  wealth.  We  maintain  that 
the  entire  capacity  of  the  State  hospitals  should  be  ap 
propriated  to  the  poor  patients,  before  any  such  are 
refused  admission  or  sent  away  under  any  pretext 
whatever.  The  hospital  at  Dixmont,  though  a  private 
charitable  corporation,  and  only  aided  by  the  State, 
comes  much  nearer  to  our  idea  of  the  duty  and  the  in 
tention  of  the  State  in  this  regard  than  that  at  Harris- 
burg.  At  the  former,  there  remained,  at  the  close  of 
the  year  1872,  only  one  hundred  and  seventeen  private 
patients  out  of  a  total  of  four  hundred  and  forty-six  ; 
and  on  September  3Oth,  1873,  only  23.89  per  cent,  of 
"paying"  patients,  or  one  hundred  and  eight  out  of  a 
total  of  four  hundred  and  fifty-two. 

And  again,  of  the  one  hundred  and  sixteen  patients 
received  into  the  State  hospital,  at  Harrisburg,  during 
the  nine  months  ending  September  3Oth,  1873,  eighty- 
four,  or  nearly  three-fourths,  were  "paying"  patients; 
while  for  the  same  period  out  of  one  hundred  and 
seventy-three  patients  admitted  to  the  hospital  at  Dix 
mont,  only  seventy-two,  or  about  two-fifths,  were  "pay 
ing"  patients.  In  other  words,  30.79  per  cent,  more 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  285 

private  patients  were  received  into  the  State  hospital  for 
the  " insane  poor,"  at  Harrisburg,  than  into  the- private 
hospital  for  the  insane  (aided  by  the  State)  at  Dixmont. 

It  may  be  said,  and  perhaps  with  truth,  that  in  many 
cases  the  friends  of  insane  patients  who  can  furnish  the 
smaller  sum  required  at  the  State  hospital  for  their 
support  would  not  be  able  to  meet  the  heavier  charges 
of  a  private  asylum  ;  and  that,  therefore,  such  insane 
patients  must  be  thus  admitted  at  the  hospital  or  sent 
to  the  poor-house.  This  idea  seems  highly  plausible 
and  might  at  first  receive  favor  from  inconsiderate 
persons.  But  upon  reflection  it  clearly  appears  un 
sound  in  theory;  and  upon  experience  it  proves  highly 
objectionable.  If  these  patients  are  poor  why  should 
precisely  this  class  of  poor  patients  have  precedence 
of  those  who  are  still  poorer?  And  if  they  are  rich, 
as  by  the  terms  of  the  statute  all  "  paying "  patients 
are,  then  the  law  expressly  gives  the  poor  the  preced 
ence  over  them.  Besides  all  these  middle  measures  of 
giving  public  aid  to  the  poor  are  found  in  practice  to 
be  dangerous  and  liable  to  great  abuses  on  the  part 
both  of  the  recipients  and  the  almoners  of  the  public 
bounty.  This  case  has  proved  itself  in  our  judgment 
no  exception  to  the  general  rule. 

It  may  be  suggested  that  it  has  been  thought  well  to 
have  some  paying  patients  in  order  to  give  respecta 
bility  to  the  institution. 

We  can  scarcely  listen  to  the  suggestion  with  pa 
tience  or  answer  it  with  calmness.  If  all  the  poor  were 
already  provided  for  and  accommodated  the  suggestion 
might  pass,  although  we  should  not  make  it.  We 
should  never  propose  that  the  State  should  tax  herself 


286  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

to  furnish  hospital  accommodations  to  the  rich  in  any 
case,  whether  by  way  of  gratuity  or  of  profitable 
speculation.  But  that  is  not  the  case.  The  poor  are 
not  all  enjoying  the  care  and  treatment  of  the  hos 
pitals  ;  and  shall  they  by  the  hundred  and  the  thousand 
continue  to  languish  into  idiocy  or  rave  out  their  mis 
erable  lives  in  the  cells  of  prisons  with  malefactors  and 
felons,  or  in  the  more  foul  and  wretched  and  hopeless 
receptacles  of  county  poor-houses,  in  order  that  the 
hospital,  which  receives  a  few  score  of  them,  may  be 
respectable,  and  its  superintendents  and  officers  may 
not  find  themselves  in  charge  of  an  institution  of  mere 
paupers  ? 

But,  finally,  it  may  be  said,  as  a  partial  explanation 
of  the  great  comparative  rapidity  with  which  the  poor 
who  are  committed  to  the  hospital  are  sent  away,  that 
a  large  part  of  them — those  committed  by  the  courts — 
are  persons  charged  with  crime  who  have  been  ac 
quitted  on  the  ground  of  insanity.  Under  the  present 
law  this  explanation  must  to  a  certain  extent  be 
accepted;  but  as  these  persons  do  not  fall  under  the 
general  class  of  the  insane  now  under  consideration, 
viz.,  those  who  have  done  no  harm  and  are  free  from 
any  charge  of  crime,  their  case  is  reserved  for  con 
sideration  in  the  sequel. 

In  the  class  of  harmless  insane  we  include,  it  will  be 
remembered,  all  those  who  are  legally  charged  with  no 
acts  of  mischief,  violence,  or  crime;  as  well,  therefore, 
those  from  whom  such  acts  may  be  apprehended  as 
those  who,  from  their  apparently  gentle  and  inoffensive 
habits,  are  the  objects  of  no  such  fear.  Whether  there 
be  any  of  the  insane  so  entirely  harmless  that  they 


CARE    OF   THE  INSANE.  287 

can  be  trusted  with  absolute  confidence,  needing  no 
special  watch  or  restraint,  some  have  doubted,  and  we 
need  not  decide  or  discuss  the  question  ;  for,  in  our 
clear  judgment,  there  is  no  good  reason  why  those 
who  may  need  greater  degrees  of  watchful  care  and 
restraint  should  not  be  treated  in  the  same  establish 
ments  with  those  who  may  need  less,  especially  as  the 
distinction  is  merely  one  of  varying  degrees.  Even 
those  who  exhibit  the  greatest  developments  of  insane 
cunning  for  mischief  or  are  subject  to  the  fiercest 
paroxysms  of  violence  or  even  of  homicidal  impulse, 
may  be  kept,  with  proper  classifications  and  internal 
arrangements,  in  the  same  institution  with  patients  of 
the  greatest  gentleness  and  quietness  of  temper  and 
demeanor.  At  all  events,  the  proper  hospital,  with  its 
more  skillful  superintendence  and  its  more  varied  and 
thorough  appliances,  is,  of  all  others,  precisely  the 
place  for  the  former  class  ;  for  in  poor-houses  they  can 
scarcely  be  kept  at  all,  except  as  wild  beasts,  and 
prisons  are  not  places  to  which  justice  or  humanity  can 
doom  the  innocent  and  helpless  madman,  however  vio 
lent  or  dangerous.  Yet  are  not  such  poor,  defense 
less  unfortunates,  if  adjudged  too  dangerous  to  go  at 
large  and  pronounced  not  curable,  habitually  sent  to 
rave  and  rot  in  the  foul  dens  of  a  poor-house  or  in  the 
dungeons  of  a  prison,  there  to  be  classed  with  robbers 
and  murderers? 

The  importance  of  having  the  State  hospitals  for  the 
insane  subjected  in  this  and  in  other  respects  to  the 
supervision  of  some  party  not  connected  with  the 
immediate  management,  so  that  the  rights  of  the 
poor  may  be  more  surely,  steadily,  and  systematically 


288  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

protected,  we  reserve  for  fuller  consideration  further  on. 
But  we  cannot  omit  to  observe  here,  that  the  State 
hospitals  for  the  insane  poor  were  not  devised  originally 
at  the  suggestion  of  experts,  but  upon  the  pains-taking 
investigations  and  earnest  petitions  of  Miss  Dix  and 
other  benevolent  persons ;  and  it  is  highly  reasonable 
that  their  management,  particularly  as  regards  the  re 
ceiving  and  discharging  of  patients,  should  be  placed 
under  the  visitorial  power  of  disinterested  parties, 
concerned  only  in  securing  the  good  to  be  derived 
from  them  for  the  defenseless  insane  poor.  It  is  not 
to  be  supposed,  however,  that,  under  any  management, 
sufficient  provision  has  yet  been  made  in  our  State  hos 
pitals  for  all  the  insane  poor  in  the  Commonwealth. 

Such  provision  ought  to  be  made  with  all  possible 
dispatch.  To  propose  to  make  it  is  no  wild  or  vision 
ary  or  extravagant  scheme.  It  can  be  made  in  Penn 
sylvania  as  well  as  in  New  York.  As  we  have  already 
shown,  if  we  are  to  take  care  of  the  insane  poor  at 
all  at  the  public  expense,  the  most  economical  method, 
irrespective  of  the  demands  of  humanity,  is  to  gather 
them  into  well-managed  hospitals,  instead  of  leaving 
them  to  linger  out  a  miserable  existence,  hopeless  of 
restoration,  in  prisons  and  poor-houses. 

We  proceed  now  to  consider  the  case  of  the  two 
other  classes  of  the  insane. 

II.  Those  who,  while  sane,  have  committed  acts  of 
violence  or  crime,  but  have  either 

i.  Become  insane  before  arraignment,  and  so  have 
never  been  tried  ;  or, 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  289 

2.  Have  become  insane  after  conviction — insane 
convicts. 

III.  Those  who  were  insane  at  the  time  of  commit 
ting  such  acts,  and  who,  therefore,  have  been  acquitted 
of  crime  on  the  ground  of  their  insanity.  These  fall 
into  various  sub-divisions  to  be  mentioned  hereafter. 

The  two  classes  (i)  those  who  stand  charged  or  con 
victed  of  committing  acts  of  violence  or  mischief  while 
sane ;  and  (2)  those  who,  although  charged  with  crime 
for  the  commission  of  such  acts,  have  been  acquitted 
on  the  ground  of  insanity  at  the  time  of  their  commis 
sion,  we  place  together,  not  to  identify  or  confound 
them  under  any  such  denomination  as  "  criminal  in 
sane,"  but  rather  in  order  the  more  emphatically  to 
centra-distinguish  them. 

We  begin  with  the  case  of  the  first  of  these  classes  ; 
and  the  question  is,  what  disposition  is  to  be  made  of 
the  insane  who  stand  charged  with,  or  have  been  con 
victed  of,  crime.  And  first  of  those  who  may,  with 
some  propriety,  be  called  "  the  criminal  insane,"  i.  e., 
those  who  are  charged  with  the  commission  of  crime 
while  sane,  but  who  have  become  insane  before  arraign 
ment;  and  who,  consequently,  have  never  been  con 
victed  or  tried.  Their  case  is  a  somewhat  delicate  one 
in  a  legal  as  well  as  a  moral  point  of  view.  According 
to  legal  principles,  it  would  seem  that  their  detention 
cannot  be  regarded  as  a  punishment,  for  they  are  not 
to  be  presumed  guilty  because  they  are  charged  with 
crime,  nor  until  they  are  found  guilty  upon  trial  and 
proof;  but  in  their  present  condition  they  are  not 


290  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

capable  of  pleading,  and,  of  course,  cannot  be  put 
upon  their  trial.  Both  as  accused  and  as  dangerous 
persons,  they  may  properly  be  kept  under  detention 
and  restraint ;  but  neither  in  fact  nor  in  feeling  are  they 
to  be  classed  with  felons  or  looked  upon  as  tainted 
with  crime,  or  as  suffering  a  penalty.  The  fact  of  their 
present  lunacy  may  be  ascertained  and  established 
without  the  intervention  of  a  jury,  by  the  court  itself, 
or  by  a  commission  appointed  for  the  purpose ;  but 
their  having  committed  the  criminal  acts  laid  to  their 
charge,  and  having  committed  them  in  a  sound  state  of 
mind,  can  be  ascertained  and  determined  only  by  the 
intervention  and  verdict  of  a  jury;  and  any  investiga 
tion  or  inquiry  in  that  direction,  instituted  without  such 
intervention,  and  without  a  hearing  of  the  defendant, 
must  necessarily  be  merely  ex parte.  And  it  is  but  the 
natural  course  of  things,  when  a  poor,  friendless  man, 
in  his  squalor  and  raggedness,  is  arraigned  before  a 
court,  under  the  charge  of  some  atrocious  crime,  ac 
companied  by  the  confident  allegation  that,  whatever 
may  be  his  present  mental  condition,  he  was  sane  up 
to  and  at  the  time  of  the  commission  of  the  acts 
charged  against  him — it  is  but  the  natural  course  of 
things,  that  such  a  man  is  easily  believed  and  presumed 
to  be  guilty ;  and  as  society  must  at  all  events  be  pro 
tected  from  his  violence,  whether  sane  or  insane,  he  is 
consigned,  side  by  side,  with  the  convicts  and  felons,  to 
the  safe-keeping  of  a  prison  cell. 

But  surely  this  ought  not  to  be  so — in  all  reason  it 
ought  not  to  be  so.  The  State  owes  it  to  her  own  self- 
respect,  to  her  own  sense  of  justice,  if  not  to  her  senti 
ments  of  humanity,  not  to  consign  to  the  odium  and 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  291 

punishment  of  crime,  one  of  her  citizens  whose  guilt 
has  never  been  duly  ascertained.  What  then  shall  be 
done  with  such  persons  ?  That  is  a  serious  question, 
and  we  shall  endeavor  to  answer  it.  But,  for  the 
present,  we  only  say,  what  is  clear  in  the  face  of  the 
matter,  that  they  ought  not  to  be  placed  in  prison,  or 
in  any  department  of  a  prison  ;  and  they  ought  to  be 
placed  where  they  not  only  will  be  effectually  restrained 
from  doing  harm,  but  where  they  will  have  the  best 
curative  treatment,  and  the  best  prospect  of  being  re 
stored  from  their  fearful  malady. 

The  case  of  insane  convicts — that  is,  of  those  who 
become  insane  after  conviction  and  while  undergoing 
the  punishment  of  crime — is  different  from  the  foregoing 
in  several  important  particulars.  For  these  the  ques 
tion  of  guilt  is  presumed  to  have  been  duly  ascertained, 
and  that  they  are  suffering  a  just  punishment,  but  in 
the  midst  of  it  the  mind  loses  its  balance,  and  they 
become  lunatics.  Supposing  this  point  to  be  ascer 
tained  and  admitted — and  the  feigning  of  madness  is 
pretty  easily  detected — then  they  are  no  longer  re 
sponsible  beings  ;  they  are  no  longer  proper  subjects 
of  prison  discipline.  It  is  utterly  unreasonable  and 
unjust,  as  well  as  inhuman,  to  continue  to  inflict  punish 
ment  on  a  maniac,  who  neither  knows  the  reason,  nor 
the  end,  nor  the  idea  of  rightful  punishment.  It  is 
as  absurd  as  to  inflict  indignities  or  violence  upon  the 
dead  body  of  a  criminal ;  it  is  even  more  malignant,  for 
the  dead  body  has  no  sense  of  pain,  but  the  maniac  has. 

Besides,  the  State  owes  it  to  these  helpless  beings, 
who,  while  under  her  enforced  control  and  guardian 
ship,  have  been  smitten  down  with  the  most  terrible  of 


292  CARE    OF   THE  INSANE. 

maladies — owes  it  to  them  as  a  mere  matter  of  right, — 
to  give  them  the  most  skillful  and  promising  curative 
treatment  in  her  power,  to  save  them,  if  possible,  from 
confirmed  and  permanent  mania  or  imbecility.  To 
suffer  a  convict  to  become,  from  neglect,  an  incurable 
lunatic  is  worse,  unspeakably  worse,  than  to  dismiss 
him,  at  the  expiration  of  his  sentence,  bereft  of  sight 
or  hearing,  or  crippled  by  loss  of  limbs,  or  under  some 
chronic  bodily  disease,  in  consequence  of  a  reckless 
neglect  of  the  proper  medical  care  and  treatment  at 
the  proper  time.  These  irremediable  losses  and  dis 
abilities  formed  no  part  of  his  sentence. 

The  State  is  bound,  so  far  as  she  reasonably  can,  to 
discharge  the  convict,  at  the  close  of  his  term  of 
punishment,  in  at  least  as  good  a  condition — mental, 
moral,  and  physical — as  that  in  which  she  received  him. 
And,  for  failing  in  this,  it  will  not  do  to  seek  an  excuse 
in  the  small  number,  or  the  unworthy  character  of 
those  who  may  suffer  the  wrong.  The  State,  the  very 
fountain  of  justice,  she  who  takes  it  upon  herself  to 
punish  wrongs,  is  bound  to  do  no  wrong  even  to  one, 
and  that  one  the  meanest  and  most  undeserving  of  her 
citizens.  If  there  are  but  few  convicts  who  need 
surgical  or  medical  treatment,  whether  for  bodily  or 
mental  diseases,  so  much  the  less  excuse  is  there,  at 
least  on  the  ground  of  economy,  for  neglecting  them. 

Nor  is  this  all.  Even  of  those  who  are  strictly  in 
sane  convicts  in  the  legal  sense,  and  it  is  of  those  only 
we  are  now  treating,  i.  e.,  of  those  who  have  been  con 
victed  of  crime,  as  having  been  sane  both  at  the  time 
of  the  commission  and  the  conviction,  but  being  found 
insane  afterwards, — even  of  these  it  would  be  easy  to 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  293 

show  that  by  far  the  larger  number  were  probably  in 
sane  before  conviction,  and  even  at  the  time  of  the 
commission  of  the  alleged  offense.  It  is  the  rich  and 
respectable  offender,  who  has  friends  and  money,  who 
can  fee  lawyers,  who  can  procure  and  array  a  crowd  of 
witnesses  in  his  behalf,  who  can  protract  his  trial,  clog 
the  wheels  of  justice,  and  make  interest  by  his  audacity- 
it  is  he  who  too  often  escapes  from  merited  punishment 
under  a  mistaken  verdict  of  insanity.  But  the  poor 
friendless  man,  who  has  been  seized  in  some  terrible 
act  of  atrocity,  though  committed  under  the  impulse  of 
actual  insanity,  is  swiftly  arraigned;  and,  having  nobody 
of  any  consideration  or  influence  who  personally  cares 
for  him  to  stand  by  him  or  advise  him  ;  without  testi 
mony,  and,  from  his  very  unsoundness  of  mind,  per 
haps,  neither  caring  nor  knowing  how  to  procure  it; 
the  evidence  against  him  ample  and  clear,  his  defense 
provided  by  the  court  being  merely  professional  and 
perfunctory,  and,  of  course,  under  such  circumstances, 
both  hasty  and  imperfect,  he  is  forthwith  convicted  and 
sentenced  to  the  penitentiary  or  the  gallows.  That 
this  is  no  fancy  picture,  but  a  familiar  matter  of  fact,  is 
established  by  an  abundance  of  proof.  The  uniform 
testimony  of  those  who  have  charge  of  jails  and 
penitentiaries  is,  that  almost  all  the  so-called  insane 
convicts  under  their  charge  were  insane  when  brought 

o  o 

to  prison,  and  so  were  almost  certainly  insane  when 
tried,  and  probably  so  when  they  committed  the 
offenses  for  which  they  were  convicted. 

Dr.  Compton,  in  charge  of  the  State  Lunatic  Asy 
lum  of  Mississippi,  says  : — "  My  own  experience  with 
insane  criminals  leads  me  to  feel  rather  charitable 


294  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

towards  them.  I  have  had  only  three,  and  there  have 
been  circumstances  connected  with  each  of  these  cases 
which  lead  me  to  think  they  were  insane  before  com 
mitting  the  crime." 

Of  the  eighteen  prisoners  reported  insane  in  the 
Eastern  Penitentiary  in  1852,  the  inspectors  declare 
that  "  three  had  been  placed  in  the  penitentiary  for 
safe-keeping  only,  and  not  for  crime,  and  had  already 
been  confined  in  its  cells — one  nearly  three,  one  over 
three,  and  one  over  seven  years  !  Eleven  of  the  re 
maining  fifteen  were  more  or  less  insane  when  they 
were  received  into  the  penitentiary,  two  of  the  others 
became  so  a  few  months  after,  one  a  year,  and  one 
about  four  years  after  his  reception.  It  will  thus  be 
seen  that  a  large  proportion  were  insane  in  a  greater 
or  less  degree  when  first  sentenced  to  the  penitentiary, 
and  all  but  one  or  two  of  the  rest  developed  it  shortly 
after.  The  observation  and  experience  of  the  inspect 
ors  have  convinced  them  that  the  commission  of  crime 
is  more  frequently  connected  with  mental  disease  than 
courts  and  juries  (far  less  the  public)  suspect:  hence 
the  necessity  of  a  prompt  removal  of  all,  who  are  found 
to  be  thus  afflicted,  to  a  place  where  proper  treatment 
may  restore  them  to  mental  health,  and,  as  a  conse 
quence,  to  moral  rectitude."  Nor  did  this  state  of 
affairs  cease  at  a  later  period.  In  their  report  for 
1862,  the  inspectors  repeat  that  "there  are  yearly 
received  into  this  penitentiary  insane  convicts,  insane 
or  of  diseased  mental  condition,  on  their  admission." 
And  again,  in  1863: — "  The  inspectors  again  ask  the 
legislature  to  require  the  State  Lunatic  Asylum  to  take 
insane  convicts,  or  to  make  an  appropriation  for  their 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  295 

medical  treatment  in  the  penitentiary.  When  so  many 
convicts  are  known  to  be  insane  on  reception  into  this 
prison,  this  course  is  wise,  humane,  and  necessary." 

There  are  now  about  twenty  of  these  "  insane  crimi 
nals  "  in  the  two  penitentiaries,  all  of  whom,  according 
to  the  reports  of  the  wardens,  were  insane  or  imbecile 
when  received  there.  We  insert  here  the  report  of 
Mr.  Townsend,  warden  of  the  Eastern  Penitentiary, 
made  on  this  subject  in  October  last,  and  also  that  of 
Captain  Wrigkt,  warden  of  the  Western  Penitentiary, 
made  on  November  24th. 

REPORT  OF  WARDEN  TOWNSEND. 

« 

"E.  S.  PENITENTIARY,  October  24th,  1873. 

"  To  George  L.  Harrison,  Esq., 

11  President  of  the  Board  of  State  Charities, 

"  DEAR  SIR  : — I  sent  you  a  list,  some  time  ago,  of 
eleven  persons  confined  in  this  penitentiary  who  were 
more  or  less  insane.  Since  that  time  one  has  died, 
and  one  was  pardoned  by  the  governor  of  the  State, 
leaving  now  in  confinement  nine.  The  one  who  was 
pardoned  is  now  an  inmate  of  an  insane  asylum.  The 
nine  who  remain  were  all  noted  on  our  physician's 
book  as  '  insane',  or  '  mentally  unsound'  at  the  time  of 
admission.  One  was  sent  here  twenty-three  years  and 
ten  months  ago,  charged  with  assault  and  battery  with 
intent  to  kill,  and  sentenced,  not  for  a  term  of  years, 
but  for  safe-keeping  ;  he  is  a  harmless  imbecile.  One 
was  sent  here  from  Luzerne  county  for  ten  years,  on  a 


296  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

charge  of  burglary  and  larceny.  The  object  seemed 
to  be  to  rid  the  neighborhood  of  a  troublesome  fellow. 
One  sent  from  Northampton  county  for  ten  years  on 
charge  of  rape.  One  from  Bradford  county,  charged 
with  child-murder,  holding  his  own  child  under  water, 
to  see  the  effect  of  it,  thus  proving  the  insanity  of  the 
act ;  his  sentence  is  twelve  years.  A  woman  from 
Luzerne  county,  for  shooting  her  husband,  sentenced 
to  eleven  years  and  eleven  months.  She  is  very  crazy/ 
and  not  a  fit  subject  for  penitentiary  discipline. 

"  One  woman  on  several  charges  of  larceny,  sen 
tenced  to  nine  years.  This  woman  has  been  an  inmate 
of  an  insane  asylum.  One  from  Luzerne  county,  for 
'  injury  to  railroad.'  He  piled  lumber  on  the  road  to 
see  how  it  would  be  scattered  by  the  engine  (a  crazy 
man's  trick).  One  from  Philadelphia,  for  aggravated 
assault  and  battery,  sentenced  to  seven  years,  very 
weak-minded  on  admission,  and  easily  provoked  to 
violence.  One  from  Philadelphia,  for  wife-murder, 
sentence  ten  years ;  insane  on  admission.  These  in 
dividuals  have  received  such  care  and  attention  as  we 
were  enabled  to  give  them,  but  we  have  no  accommo 
dations  for  insane  patients — no  rooms  larger  than  the 
ordinary  cells.  They  have  had  such  medical  care  as 
our  resident  physician  was  able  to  give  them,  but  we 
have  no  suitable  nurses,  nor  places  for  any.  I  consider 
it  very  improper,  very  unkind,  very  cruel,  to  send  in 
sane  persons  to  a  jail  or  penitentiary.  It  is  almost 
certain  to  fasten  the  malady  upon  them,  until  it  becomes 
irremediable.  A  hospital,  with  hospital  appliances,  is 
the  only  place  for  these  poor  stricken  ones. 

"  I  think  that  a  hospital  for  the  insane  should  not  be 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  297 

connected  in  any  way  with  a  prison,  but  be  entirely 
separate,  and  under  separate  administration. 

"  Could  not  a  part  of  the  Danville  Asylum  be  thus 
used  ? 

"  Hoping  these  interrogatories  are  sufficiently  an 
swered,  I  remain,  very  truly  and  respectfully,  thy  friend, 

"EDWARD  TOWNSEND, 

"Warden" 


REPORT  OF  WARDEN  WRIGHT. 

"  ALLEGHENY,  PA.,  November  24th,  1873. 

"  Geo.  L.  If  arris  on,  Esq., 

"  President  of  Board  of  Public  Charities, 

"DEAR  SIR: — In  your  letter  of  i7th  of  October, 
you  request  that  I  give  you  my  views  on  the  subject  of 
the  treatment  of  the  criminal  insane  confined  in  peni 
tentiaries  and  jails. 

"The  subject  has  often  been  referred  to  in  the 
annual  reports  of  this  penitentiary,  and  the  inspectors, 
in  their  report  for  1844,  say: — 'If,  in  the  present 
pecuniary  embarrassment  of  the  Commonwealth,  you 
cannot  erect  and  endow  a  State  asylum  for  the  insane, 
we  must  urge  upon  you  the  propriety  and  necessity  of 
authorizing  us  to  establish,  within  the  prison  walls,  a 
hospital  for  the  reception  of  the  limited  number  of 
demented  convicts  which  may  unhappily  come  under 
our  supervision.  The  occurrence  is  rare  that  they 


298  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

become  so  after  they  enter  the  penitentiary ;  but,  in 
many  instances,  they  are  sent  here  after  the  commission 
of  crime,  because  there  is  no  other  barrier  to  protect 
society  from  their  demoniac  depredations.  There  is  a 
convict  of  this  character  now  immured  in  one  of  our 
cells,  for  such  is  the  sentence  of  the  law.  He  came 
here  in  this  lamentable  condition.'  In  the  report  for 
1857  it  is  said,  'convicts  are  often  sent  here  whose 
proper  destination  should  be  the  State  Lunatic  Hospi 
tal.  Why  they  are  sent  here,  whether  for  the  purpose 
of  supposed  relief  to  the  treasury  of  the  county  from 
which  they  come ;  from  culpable  ignorance  of  the  law 
regulating  the  State  Lunatic  Asylum,  or  from  the 
suggestion,  flattering  to  us,  that  we  will  take  good  care 
of  them,  and  that  society  at  large  will  be  exempt  from 
the  dangers  incident  to  a  too  close  proximity  to  mad 
men  ;  it  is  a  practice  alike  contrary  to  the  policy  of  the 
law  and  the  dictates  of  humanity.' 

"  I  have  thus  far  made  up,  as  briefly  as  practicable, 
from  our  own  reports,  evidence  that  insanity  has  proven 
no  bar  to  conviction  and  confinement  in  the  peniten 
tiary,  and  do  not  doubt  further  evidence  could  be 
given  showing  that  harmless  imbecile  prisoners  have 
been  received  and  discharged  without  further  record 
than  such  as  was  given  to  other  prisoners. 

"As  having  a  direct  bearing  upon  the  views  expressed 
in  a  former  report,  that  prisons  are  often  used  as 
asylums,  the  following  extract  from  the  report  of  the 
warden  of  the  Eastern  Penitentiary,  for  the  year  1871, 
bears  pertinent  testimony: — '  Men  are  frequently  sent  to 
this  penitentary  who  are  not  fit  subjects  for  its  discip 
line.  During  the  year  four  men  were  received  who 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  299 

were  quite  insane  when  admitted ;  one  in  unsound 
mind  ;  and  four  of  weak  intellect.  One  of  these  insane 
prisoners  died  of  tetanus,  resulting  from  injuries  inflicted 
upon  himself  shortly  after  his  reception,  and  another 
committed  suicide  in  one  month  after  he  came  here. 
Of  the  nine  hundred  and  eleven  confined  in  1871, 
twelve  were  insane  when  admitted;  four  of  unsound 
mind ;  two  feeble-minded,  and  thirty-six  of  weak  in 
tellect,  bordering  on  idiocy.' 

"  In  the  annual  report  of  the  Eastern  Penitentiary 
for  1872,  it  is  stated  that  two  hundred  and  twenty-six 
convicts  were  received  during  the  year,  of  whom  one 
was  of  unsound  mind,  four  were  weak-minded,  fifteen 
were  dull,  and  two  doubtful,  making  nearly  ten  per 
cent,  of  impaired  intellect.  Of  the  two  hundred  and 
seventeen  convicts  discharged,  one  insane  died,  two 
were  weak-minded,  and  thirteen  were  dull,  being  nearly 
seven  and  a  half  per  cent,  of  the  discharged  impaired 
in  intellect. 

"Under  the  provisions  of  the  act  of  1852,  four 
prisoners  were  removed  in -December,  1859,  of  whom 
the  physician  of  the  prison  states  : — '  It  would  be  absurd 
to  assert  that  no  case  of  insanity  ever  occurred  in  this 
prison;  but  to  show  the  probable  effect  of  the  discipline 
in  these  cases,  I  will  refer  to  their  condition  on  admis 
sion : — No.  1419,  general  good  health,  but  appears  to 
be  of  unsound  mind ;  circumstances  had  led  to  the 
belief  of  insanity  before  he  was  brought  to  the  prison. 
No.  1485,  general  good  health.  No.  1987,  good  health, 
but  owing  to  his  inability  to  speak  English,  his  mental 
condition  was  not  recognized,  but  I  now  have  no  doubt 
he  was  insane  when  admitted.  No.  2094,  insane/ 


300  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

One  of  the  above-noted  prisoners,  No.  1485,  was  re 
turned  to  the  prison  exactly  three  months  after  his 
transfer  to  the  hospital,  of  whom  it  is  afterwards 
entered  that  he  died  in  the  prison,  insane,  in  January, 
1862,  after  an  imprisonment  of  ten  years  and  nine 
months.  The  physician  notes  in  his  official  report, 
'  upon  his  return  here,  he  was  decidedly  insane.'  (Dix- 
mont  Hospital  was  not  then  open.) 

"  The  physician's  record  of  insane  prisoners  as  given 
to  your  board,  and  printed  on  page  fourteen  of  report 
for  1870,  in  brief,  shows  that  one  prisoner  died  in  1862 
(previously  noted  as  received  in  good  health  in  1851), 
and  seven  others  were  received  from  1863  to  1868; 
five  were  sent  to  Dixmont  by  order  of  the  governor, 
and  two  were  discharged  insane.  All  were  insane  or 
of  feeble  intellect  when  admitted. 

"  The  physician  notices  eight  cases  of  the  various 
forms  of  insanity  under  treatment  in  1871,  who  are 
stated  to  have  been  received  insane ;  four  were  trans 
ferred  from  the  Eastern  Penitentiary ;  one  had  been 
in  several  insane  asylums  ;  one  when  received  was  a 
mental  and  physical  wreck  (since  dead);  one  had  been 
held  in  jail  a  long  time,  owing  to  uncertainty,  is  still 
confined,  a  complete  imbecile ;  one  had  been  unsound 
as  to  his  mental  health.  He  was  sent  to  Dixmont, 
where  he  remained  for  several  years.  None  of  the 
cases  originated  in  this  prison.  The  report  for  1872 
contains  further  mention  of  the  four  cases  remaining 
over  from  the  preceding  year. 

"  The  records  of  jails  and  other  institutions  within 
the  Commonwealth,  if  culled  from  the  official  reports 
to  your  board,  would  furnish  abundant  evidence  of 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  301 

the  need  for  a  change  in  the  present  method  of  treat 
ment  of  the  criminal  insane. 

"  I  doubt  not  you  will  recommend  some  important 
changes,  and  whether  you  favor  the  erection  of  a  State 
asylum  for  the  '  criminal  insane/  or  endeavor  to  meet 
the  present  exigency  by  procuring  the  setting  apart  of 
a  wing  in  one  or  more  of  the  existing  State  lunatic 
hospitals,  I  trust  you  will  arrive  at  a  satisfactory  solu 
tion  of  this  important  question,  and  submit  a  plan  wise 
in  its  details  and  ennobling  in  its  humanity. 
"  Very  respectfully, 

"  EDWARD  S.  WRIGHT, 

"  Warden" 

We  pass  now  to  the  consideration  of  the  third  class 
of  insane  persons,  viz.,  of  those  who,  having  committed 
acts  of  violence  or  mischief,  are  acquitted  of  crime  on 
the  ground  of  insanity. 

Here  we  presume  that  those  persons  who  commit 
such  acts  under  a  partial  aberration  of  mind  or  a 
monomania  or  a  sudden  impulse,  which  did  not  destroy 
or  disable  the  power  of  rational  moral  judgment;  or 
under  a  temporary  delirious  excitement,  resulting  from 
their  own  deliberate  action,  and  the  cause  of  which  was 
under  their  own  control,  as  in  a  fit  of  intoxication,  are 
not  to  be  regarded  as  properly  insane,  and  should  not 
be  acquitted  of  crime  on  that  ground.  But  acts  com 
mitted  in  a  state  of  proper  insanity — that  is  to  say, 
when  the  whole  rational  faculty  is  so  deranged  that  the 
moral  judgment,  the  power  of  discrimination  between 
right  and  wrong,  is,  by  the  visitation  of  Providence, 
utterly  blotted  out  or  partially  paralyzed ;  such  acts, 


302  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

however  destructive  or  atrocious,  cannot,  without  great 
impropriety  and  even  absurdity,  be  denominated  crimes; 
and  those  who  so  commit  them  cannot  be  classed  among 
criminals.  An  "insane  criminal"  as  an  expression  in 
tended  to  describe  a  person  as  having  committed  a 
crime  while  in  a  state  of  insanity,  is  a  contradiction  in 
terms. 

How  the  facts  are  to  be  ascertained  in  these  cases 
or  what  are  the  proper  evidences,  is  not  a  point  which 
concerns  us  at  present ;  such  questions  belong  to  courts, 
juries,  and  experts ;  but  if  the  facts  have  been  ascer 
tained  and  adjudicated ;  'if  there  is  admitted  to  have 
existed  in  the  person  arraigned  such  a  general  mental 
derangement  as  obliterated  the  moral  judgment,  or  any 
other  mania  which  involved  the  loss  or  subversion  of 
the  moral  judgment  and  control,  in  relation  to  those 
acts  to  which  the  impulse  or  propensity  points,  whether 
such  be  judged  and  found  curable  or  incurable,  and 
whether  the  lunatic  be  adjudged  dangerous  or  harm 
less  ;  then  such  acts  cannot  be  reckoned  crimes,  and 
the  person  who  has  committed  them  cannot,  without 
gross  injustice  and  inhumanity,  be  regarded  or  treated 
as  a  criminal.  And  such  is  presumed  to  be  the  case 
of  all  those  who  are  acquitted  of  crime  on  the  ground 
of  insanity.  Yet,  under  our  laws  and  the  administra 
tion  of  justice  (!)  in  this  Commonwealth,  numbers  of 
these  innocent  and  pitiable  sufferers  are  so  regarded 
and  treated, — especially  those  who  are  tainted  with  the 
sin  of  poverty  as  well  as  the  crime  of  insanity.  This 
is,  at  the  present  moment,  one  of  the  foulest  blots  upon 
the  escutcheon  of  our  State, — a  blot  which,  instead  of 
being  in  process  of  gradual  effacement,  has  been  made 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  303 

darker  and  deeper  by  our  more  recent  legislation.  All 
the  improvement  and  tendency  to  improvement  in  this 
respect  which  resulted  and  promised  to  result  from  the 
just  and  merciful  laws  of  1845  and  1852,  have  been  re 
tracted  and  reversed  by  the  law  of  1861. 

The  cases  of  insanity  to  which  we  now  refer  may  be 
variously  classified;  but  the  law  fixes  its  attention 
chiefly  on  that  form  of  mania  which  is  more  or  less 
dangerous  and  requires  more  or  less  restraint  for  the 
protection  of  the  community  as  well  as  for  the  safety 
of  the  patient. 

And  that  the  case  may  be  brought  clearly  and  in  one 
view  under  the  eye  of  the  members  of  the  legislature, 
we  may  be  excused  for  here  reciting  somewhat  at 
large  the  present  provisions  of  our  laws  on  this  subject 
as  they  stand  in  the  statute-book. 

PROCEEDINGS  AGAINST  CRIMINAL  LUNATICS. 
Act  of  1836. 

(At  the  time  this  act  was  passed  there  was  no  State  hospital  for  the  insane, 
and  for  want  of  such  institutions  they  were  sent  to  the  penitentiaries  and  jails.) 

SECTION  58.  In  every  case  in  which  it  shall  be  given 
in  evidence,  upon  the  trial  of  any  person  charged  with 
any  crime  or  misdemeanor,  that  such  person  was 
insane  at  the  time  of  the  commission  of  such  offense, 
and  such  person  shall  be  acquitted,  the  jury  shall  be 
required  to  find  specially  whether  such  person  was 
insane  at  the  time  of  the  commission  of  such  offense, 
and  to  declare  whether  such  person  was  acquitted  by 
them  on  the  ground  of  such  insanity,  and  if  they  shall 


304  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

so  find  and  declare,  the  court  before  whom  the  trial 
was  had  shall  have  power  to  order  such  persons  to  be 
kept  in  strict  custody,  in  such  place  and  in  such 
manner  as  to  the  said  court  shall  seem  fit,  at  the 
expense  of  the  county  in  which  the  trial  was  had,  so 
long  as  such  person  shall  continue  to  be  of  unsound 
mind. 

SEC.  59.  The  same  proceedings  may  be  had,  if  any 
person  indicted  for  an  offense  shall,  upon  arraign 
ment,  be  found  to  be  a  lunatic  by  a  jury  lawfully  im 
paneled  for  the  purpose ;  or  if  upon  the  trial  of  any 
person  so  indicted  such  person  shall  appear  to  the 
jury,  charged  with  such  indictment,  to  be  a  lunatic  ;  in 
which  case,  the  court  shall  direct  such  finding  to  be  re 
corded,  and  may  proceed  as  aforesaid. 

SEC.  60.  In  every  case  in  which  any  person,  charged 
with  any  offense,  shall  be  brought  before  the  court,  to 
be  discharged  for  want  of  prosecution,  and  shall,  by 
the  oath  or  affirmation  of  one  or  more  credible  persons, 
appear  to  be  insane,  the  court  shall  order  the  prosecu 
ting  attorney  to  send  before  the  grand  jury  a  written 
allegation  of  such  insanity,  in  the  nature  of  a  bill  of 
indictment,  and  thereupon  the  said  grand  jury  shall 
make  inquiry  into  the  case,  as  in  cases  of  crime,  and 
make  presentments  of  their  finding  to  said  court ;  and 
if  said  grand  jury  shall  affirm  said  written  allegation, 
they  shall  endorse  the  same  thereon,  thereupon  the 
court  shall  order  a  jury  to  be  impaneled  to  try  the  in 
sanity  of  such  person.  But  before  a  trial  thereof  be 
ordered,  the  court  shall  direct  notice  thereof  to  be 
given  to  the  next  of  kin  of  such  person,  by  publication 
or  otherwise,  as  the  case  may  require.  And  if  the  jury 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  305 

shall  find  such  person  to  be  insane,  the  like  proceed 
ings  may  be  had  as  aforesaid. 

SEC.  61.  Provided,  That  if  the  kindred  or  friends  of 
any  person,  who  may  have  been  acquitted,  as  aforesaid, 
on  the  ground  of  insanity,  or  in  default  of  such,  the 
guardians,  overseers,  or  supervisors  of  any  county, 
township,  or  place,  shall  give  security  in  such  amount 
as  shall  be  satisfactory  to  the  court,  with  condition  that 
such  lunatic  shall  be  restrained  from  the  commission  of 
any  offense,  by  seclusion  or  otherwise  ;  in  such  case  it 
shall  be  lawful  for  the  court  to  make  an  order  for  the 
enlargement  of  such  lunatic,  and  his  delivery  to  his 
kindred  or  friends ;  or,  as  the  case  may  be,  to  such 
guardian,  overseer,  or  supervisors. 

Act  April  1 4th,  1845. 

SECTION  8.  The  admission  of  insane  patients,  from 
the  several  counties  of  the  Commonwealth,  shall  be  in 
the  ratio  of  their  insane  population :  Provided,  That 
each  county  shall  be  entitled  to  send  at  least  one  insane 
patient. 

SEC.  9.  Indigent  persons  and  paupers  shall  be 
charged  actual  cost,  &c.,  payable  by  counties. 

SEC.  10.  The  courts  of  this  Commonwealth  shall 
have  power  to  commit  to  said  asylum  any  person 
who,  having  been  charged  with  an  offense  punishable 
by  imprisonment  or  death,  shall  have  been  found  to 
have  been  insane  in  the  manner  now  provided  by 
law,  at  the  time  the  offense  was  committed,  and  who 
still  continues  insane,  and  the  expenses  of  said  person, 


306  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

if  in  indigent  circumstances,  shall  be  paid  by  the 
county,  &c. 

SEC.   12.  The  several  constituted  authorities  having 

o 

care  and  charge  of  the  poor  of  the  respective  counties, 
districts,  and  townships,  shall  have  authority  to  send  to 
the  asylum,  such  insane  paupers  under  their  charge  as 
they  may  deem  proper  subjects,  and  they  shall  be 
severally  chargeable  with  the  expenses  of  the  care  and 
maintenance,  and  removal  to  and  from  the  asylum  of 
such  paupers. 

SEC.  14.  That  if  any  person  shall  apply  to  any  court 
of  record  within  this  Commonwealth,  having  jurisdic 
tion  of  offenses,  which  are  punishable  by  imprisonment) 
for  the  term  of  ninety  clays  or  longer,  for  the  commit 
ment  to  said  asylum  of  any  insane  person  within  the 
county  in  which  such  court  has  jurisdiction,  it  shall 
be  the  duty  of  said  court  to  inquire  into  the  fact  of  in 
sanity  in  the  manner  provided  by  law  ;  and  if  such  court 
shall  be  satisfied  that  such  person  is,  by  reason  of  in 
sanity,  unsafe  to  be  at  large,  or  if  suffering  any  un 
necessary  duress  or  hardship,  such  court  shall,  on  the 
application  aforesaid,  commit  such  insane  person  to 
said  asylum. 

SEC.  15.  In  the  order  of  admission,  the  indigent 
insane  of  this  Commonwealth  shall  have  always 
precedence  of  the  rich  [in  another  place  "paying 

patients"],  and recent  cases  shall  have  precedence 

of  those  of  long  standing. 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  307 

Act  May  4th,  1852. 

Whenever,  in  the  opinion  of  the  inspectors  of  the 
Eastern  Penitentiary,  any  of  the  prisoners  therein  con 
fined  shall  develop  such  marked  insanity  as  to  render 
their  continued  confinement  in  said  penitentiary  im 
proper,  and  their  removal  to  the  State  Lunatic  Hos 
pital  necessary  to  their  restoration,  it  shall  be  the  duty 
of  the  said  inspectors  to  submit  such  cases  to  a  board 
composed  of  the  district  attorney  of  the  county  of 
Philadelphia,  the  principal  physician  of  the  Pennsyl 
vania  Hospital  for  the  Insane,  at  Philadelphia,  and  the 
principal  physician  of  the  Friends'  Insane  Asylum,  at 
Frankford,  in  Philadelphia  county,  and  in  case  a  ma 
jority  of  them  cannot  at  any  time  when  required  attend, 
a  competent  physician  or  physicians  to  be  appointed 
by  the  Court  of  Quarter  Sessions  of  the  County 
of  Philadelphia,  in  the  place  of  such  as  cannot  attend, 
upon  whose  certificate  of  insanity  or  the  certificate  of 
any  two  transmitted  to  the  governor,  and  if  by  him 
approved,  he  shall  direct  that  said  insane  prisoners 
shall  be  by  said  inspectors  removed  to  the  State 
Lunatic  Hospital,  there  to  be  kept  and  properly  pro 
vided  for  at  the  cost  and  charge  of  the  county  from 
which  they  were  sent  to  the  penitentiary,  and  if  at  any 
time  during  the  period  for  which  any  such  insane 
prisoners  shall  have  been  sentenced  to  confinement  in 
the  Eastern  Penitentiary,  they  shall,  in  the  opinion  of 
the  trustees  of  said  lunatic  hospital,  be  so  far  restored 
as  to  render  their  return  to  said  penitentiary  safe  and 
proper,  then  the  said  trustees  shall  cause  the  said 
prisoner  to  be  returned  to  the  Eastern  Penitentiary, 


308  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

due  notice  to  be  given  to  the  clerk  of  the  court  of 
quarter  sessions  of  the  county  from  which  such 
prisoners  were  sent  to  the  penitentiary  of  all  such 
removals  or  transfers. 


Act  April  8th,  1861. 

SECTION  i.  When  application  shall  be  made  under  the 
fourteenth  section  of  the  act  of  April  I4th,  1845, to  which 
this  is  supplementary,  to  any  court  of  this  Common 
wealth,  for  the  commitment  of  any  person  to  the  Penn 
sylvania  State  Lunatic  Hospital,  it  shall  be  lawful  for 
such  court  either  to  inquire  into  the  fact  of  insanity  in 
a  summary  way,  &c. ;  and  in  all  cases,  it  shall  be  lawful 
for  the  several  courts  to  use  their  discretion  in  sending 
insane  persons  to  said  hospital,  or  cause  them  to  be 
confined  elsewhere,  as  the  said  court  may  deem  the 
case  to  be  curable  or  otherwise. 

SEC.  2.  No  person  shall  hereafter  be  sent  to  the  said 
lunatic  hospital,  under  the  tenth  section  of  act  April 
1 4th,  1 845,  or  any  other  law  of  this  Commonwealth,  who 
shall  have  been  charged  with  homicide,  or  having  en 
deavored  or  attempted  to  commit  the  same,  or  to  com 
mit  any  arson,  rape,  robbery,  or  burglary,  and  have 
been  acquitted  of  any  such  offenses  on  the  ground  of 
insanity,  or  been  proceeded  against  under  the  fifty- 
ninth  or  sixtieth  sections  of  the  act  of  1836  (see  above), 
where  the  court  trying  the  same  shall  be  satisfied  that 
it  will  be  dangerous  for  such  lunatic  to  be  at  large,  on 
account  of  having  committed  or  attempted  to  commit 
either  of  the  crimes  aforesaid;  but  such  persons  shall 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  309 

be  confined  in  a  penitentiary  or  the  prison  of  the 
proper  county. 

SEC.  3.  In  every  case  where  a  lunatic  has  been  or 
shall  be  committed  to  said  hospital,  after  an  acquittal 
of  any  crime  on  the  ground  of  insanity,  or  after  an  in 
vestigation  in  court  under  the  fifty-ninth  and  sixtieth 
sections  of  the  act  June  i3th,  1836,  or  on  account  of  its 
being  adjudged  dangerous  for  such  lunatic  to  be  at 
large  ;  and  in  all  cases  where  any  lunatic  has  been  or 
shall  be  removed  from  either  of  the  penitentiaries,  or 
any  prison  of  this  Commonwealth,  under  the  order  of 
a  judge  or  of  any  court,  it  shall  be  lawful  for  the 
trustees  of  said  hospital,  with  the  aid  of  the  super 
intending  physician,  to  inquire  carefully  into  the  situa 
tion  of  the  lunatic,  and  if  a  majority  of  the  board, 
including  the  physician,  shall  be  satisfied  that  there  is 
no  reasonable  prospect  of  a  cure  of  the  insanity  being 
effected  by  a  retention  of  the  lunatic  in  the  hospital, 
they  shall,  at  the  expense  of  the  proper  city  or  county, 
cause  him  or  her  to  be  removed  to  the  prison  of  the 
proper  county,  or  the  penitentiary  from  which  he  or 
she  was  sent. 

Thus  it  appears  that  before  1845,  before  the  erec 
tion  of  a  State  lunatic  hospital,  (i)  persons  tried  and 
acquitted  of  crime  on  the  ground  of  insanity,  (2)  per 
sons  indicted  for  an  offense  and  found  to  be  insane 
when  brought  up  for  trial,  and  (3)  persons  charged 
with  some  offense  and  brought  before  the  court,  to  be 
discharged  for  want  of  prosecution,  but  being  found  in 
a  state  of  lunacy — provided  they  have  no  friends — were 
to  be  sent  to  the  penitentiary,  the  county  jail,  or,  if  the 
county  authorities  should  give  the  required  guarantees, 


310  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

to  the  county  poor-house — as  the  court  should  judge 
most  proper. 

By  the  act  of  1845  and  the  establishment  of  the 
State  Lunatic  Hospital,  this  state  of  things  was  at  once 
and  in  prospect  greatly  improved.  This  alleviation 
was  obtained  upon  the  memorials  of  Miss  Dix  and 
other  philanthropic  citizens,  backed  by  the  follow 
ing  representation  from  the  judges  of  the  criminal 
courts : — 

The  memorial  of  Miss  Dix  to  the  legislature,  dated 
February  3d,  1845,  contains  the  following  certificate 
from  members  of  the  judiciary  in  relation  to  the  im 
prisonment  of  "  insane  criminals,"  Miss  Dix  prefacing 
its  introduction  with  this  paragraph : — 

"  Next,  after  private  families  and  poor-houses,  the 
insane  will  be  found  in  the  jails  and  penitentiaries. 
On  this  subject  the  opinion  of  some  of  your  jurists  has 
been  so  explicitly  declared,  that  I  feel  it  but  justice  to 
the  cause  to  give  this  expression  of  their  sentiments 
place  here." 

"PHILADELPHIA,  March  5th,  1839. 

"  The  want  of  an  asylum  for  the  insane  poor  often 
occasions  painful  embarrassments  to  the  courts  when 
the  defense  in  the  criminal  charge  is  insanity  fully  sus 
tained  by  proof.  Although  the  jury  may  certify  that 
their  acquittal  is  on  that  ground,  and  thus  empower  the 
court  to  order  the  prisoner  into  close  custody,  yet  that 
custody  can  be  in  no  other  place  than  the  common  prisons, — 
places  illy  qualified  for  such  a  subject  of  incarceration. 
We  cannot  doubt  that  the  ends  of  justice  would  be 
greatly  promoted  if  such  an  asylum  as  the  petitioners 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  311 

contemplated  were  established  with  proper  regulations, 
and  the  courts  were  authorized  to  commit  to  it  all  per 
sons  acquitted  of  crimes  on  the  ground  of  insanity. 

"(Signed)  EDWARD  KING, 

"  ARCHIBALD  RANDALL, 
"J.  RICHTER  JONES, 

"  Judges  of  the  Court  of  Quarter  Sessions. 
"  JAMES  TODD, 
"J.   BOUVIER, 
"R.  T.  CONRAD, 
"  Judges  of  the  Criminal  Sessions. 

"  CALVIN  BLYTHE, 
"Judge  of  the  Twelfth  Judicial  District." 

Miss  Dix  adds: — "It  is  believed  that  all  the  judges 
of  the  courts  of  the  Commonwealth  of  Pennsylvania, 
having  criminal  jurisdiction,  would  coincide  in  the 
above  opinion." 

But  by  the  act  of  1861,  now  in  force,  the  benefits 
which  had  been  secured,  or  which  it  was  hoped  would 
be  secured,  and  which  the  judiciary  thus  earnestly  de 
sired  might  be  secured,  have  been  substantially  anuulled 
and  frustrated  ;  for,  as  to  the  subsequent  act  of  April 
2Oth,  1869, — an  act  intended  to  guard  the  commitment 
to,  and  secure  a  proper  discharge  from,  private  hos 
pitals, — it  will  be  seen  immediately,  that  it  simply  pro 
vides  for  the  mode  of  procedure  in  one  particular  case, 
viz.,  in  discharging  a  person  who  has  been  acquitted  of 
crime  on  the  ground  of  insanity,  at  the  time  of  its  com 
mission,  but  who  is  alleged  now  to  be  sane.  It  pro 
vides  for  his  "  confinement,"  and  then  prescribes  how 
the  question  of  his  sanity  shall,  before  his  discharge, 


312  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

be  adjudicated.  It  is,  in  fact,  legislation  for  the  sane  and 
not  for  the  insane.  (See  Judge  Brewster's  "  opinion," 
further  on.) 

Under  the  first  section  of  this  act  (1861)  a  person, 
a  man  or  woman,  though  free  from  the  taint  or  charge 
of  any  crime  whatever,  having  committed  no  act  of  vio 
lence  or  mischief, — a  poor,  pitiable,  harmless  lunatic, — 
may  be  sent  to  jail  for  indefinite  incarceration  ;  and 
if,  upon  summary  examination,  such  person  is  thought 
to  be  more  probably  incurable,  it  is  more  than  suggest 
ed  to  be  the  DUTY  of  the  court  to  send  him  to  prison. 
And,  if  once  sent  there,  his  case  is  remediless,  unless 
he  can  get  through  the  provision  of  section  three,  and 
we  shall  see  what  probability  there  is  of  that. 

Under  the  second  section,  no  person  charged  with 
committing  or  attempting  to  commit  certain  heinous 
crimes,  and  acquitted  of  the  charge  on  the  ground  of 
insanity,  shall,  if  the  court  judge  it  dangerous  for  him 
to  be  at  large,  be  sent  to  the  hospital  at  all,  but  he  shall 
be  confined  in  the  penitentiary  or  the  prison  of  the  proper 
county ;  that  is  to  say,  the  only  option  left  to  the  court 
is,  either  at  once  to  discharge  such  a  person  and  let 
him  go  at  large,  or  to  commit  him  to  a  hopeless  imprison 
ment, — hopeless,  we  say,  unless  he  can  run  the  gaunt 
let  of  section  three. 

Under  this  third  section — and  this  is  the  key  to  the 
right  understanding  of  the  present  state  of  our  whole 
legislation  on  the  subject — any  lunatic  who,  (i)  upon  trial, 
has  been  acquitted  of  any  crime  whatever,  and  however 
slight,  or  (2)  who  has  been  indicted  for  any  offense,  and 
upon  being  brought  up  for  trial  has  been  found  insane, 
or  (3)  who,  when  brought  up  to  be  discharged  for  want 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  313 

of  prosecution,  is  found  insane,  or  (4)  who,  though 
never  charged  \v\ti\  any  crime  or  any  act  of  violence  or 
harm,  has  been  adjudged  dangerous  if  allowed  to  go 
at  large, — any  lunatic  of  either  of  these  four  classes, 
who  has  thereupon  been  sent  by  the  order  of  any 
court  to  a  State  hospital  for  the  insane, — as  well  as 
any  lunatic  (5)  who,  by  the  order  of  the  governor,  or 
by  any  provision  of  law,  has  been  removed  from  any 
penitentiary  or  jail  to  the  said  hospital,  may,  upon,  the 
judgment  of  the  trustees  and  superintending  physician 
of  said  hospital,  that  there  is  no  reasonable  prospect 
of  a  cure  of  his  insanity,  be  by  them,  and  by  their  sole 
and  uncontrolled  authority,  consigned  to  a  helpless 
and  hopeless  imprisonment  in  the  penitentiary  or  the 
county  jail.  (Perhaps  we  ought  to  remark,  by  the  way, 
that  the  last  words  of  the  section,  "  from  which  he  or 
she  was  sent,"  may  seem  to  confine  the  exercise  of  the 
power  of  the  hospital  authorities  to  the  fifth  class  of 
persons  before  described ;  but  as  in  that  case  the  four 
other  classes  would  have  been  enumerated  in  the 
section  without  any  enactment  in  regard  to  them,  it  is 
presumed  the  act  should  be  interpreted  as  extending 
the  same  power  of  removing  the  parties  from  the  hos 
pital  to  prison,  to  all  those  four  classes  of  cases  also; 
and  so  we  believe  it  has  always  been  interpreted.  But 
perhaps  it  is  to  the  credit  of  those  who  drew  the  act 
that  there  should  be  marks  of  haste  in  its  composition.) 
It  is  clear,  however,  that  this  act  contains  no  authority 
for  sending  any  patients,  however  incurable,  to  the 
county  poor-houses  ;  they  can  be  sent  back  only  to  the 
prison  or  the  penitentiary. 

We    must  ask  your  indulgence,  gentlemen  of  the 


31 4  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

legislature,  if  we  find  ourselves  compelled  to  speak 
harshly,  or  even  disrespectfully,  of  the  law  of  the  land. 
We  are  addressing  legislators  and  not  a  jury.  But 
what  a  law  is  this  !  Is  it  possible  that  the  members  of 
our  subsequent  legislatures, — is  it  possible  that  you, 
gentlemen,  have  been  fully  aware  of  its  extraordinary, 
of  its  atrocious,  provisions  ?  a  law  which,  we  are  con 
strained  to  say,  in  the  terrible  coolness  of  its  barbarous 
enactments,  in  its  disregard  not  only  of  all  the  claims 
of  humanity  and  justice,  but  of  the  simplest  civil  rights 
of  every  citizen,  is,  so  far  as  we  can  find,  without  a 
parallel  in  the  legislation  of  any  other  State  of  this 
Union,  or  of  any  Christian  or  civilized  community  in  the 
world.  By  this  law,  not  only  are  persons,  men  and 
women  who  are  admitted  and  solemnly  adjudged  to  be 
innocent  of  all  crime,  men  and  women  who  have  never 
even  been  charged  with  any  act  of  violence  or  harm, 
liable  to  be  hopelessly  incarcerated, — incarcerated  pro 
fessedly  for  life  (for  they  are  pronounced  probably  in 
curable,  and  this  is  their  only  crime);  incarcerated  in  the 
common  jail  or  the  penitentiary,  incarcerated  in  the 
society  of  felons,  incarcerated  where  they  can  have  no 
proper  care  or  treatment ;  not  only  this,  but  such  per 
sons  liable  to  be  so  incarcerated,  not  upon  the  verdict 
of  a  jury  of  their  fellow-citizens,  or  the  examination  and 
sentence  of  any  court  of  justice,  but  upon  the  dictum  — 
the  sole,  peremptory,  uncontrolled,  and  irreversible 
dictum — of  whom  ?  The  dictum  of  the  trustees  and 
superintending  physician  of  a  State  hospital,  a  tribunal 
unknown  elsewhere  to  the  Constitution  and  laws  of 
the  State ;  whose  rescript  overrides  and  reverses 
the  solemn  sentences  of  all  the  criminal  courts  of  the 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  315 

Commonwealth,  and  holds,  in  respect  to  them,  the  char 
acter  of  a  judgment  of  a  supreme  court  of  errors  and 
appeals;  and  the  appeal  to  this  court  is  made  by  the 
court  itself, — and  even  this  is  not  all,  but  the  court  is  the 
party  interested  to  be  ricl  of  the  care  and  burden  of  the 
poor  speechless  and  defenseless  victims,  whose  cases  are 
to  be  passed  upon  ! 

Can  anything  be  added  to  the  extraordinary  char 
acter  of  such  a  law  ?  Shall  it  be  allowed  any  longer 
to  disgrace  our  statute-book,  and  tarnish  the  fair  fame 
of  our  beloved  and  honored  State? 

No  man,  no  one  of  us,  gentlemen,  can  be  sure  that 
he  will  not  become  a  helpless  lunatic  to-morrow.  But 
does  every  citizen  of  Pennsylvania  know  that  he  is  liable, 
without  any  fault  of  his  own,  to  be  sent  at  any  time 
to  the  common  jail,  for  life-long  detention,  by  the  sole 
and  irrevocable  authority  and  sentence  of  the  superin 
tendent  and  trustees  of  a  State  lunatic  hospital?  And 
that  in  spite  of,  and  in  reversal  of,  the  contrary  judg 
ment  and  sentence  of  every  court  of  justice,  which  may 
have  passed,  or  which  by  law  can  pass,  upon  his  case  ! 

We  beg  here  to  disclaim,  once  for  all,  intending  any 
personal  reference  to  or  reflection  upon  the  estimable 
gentlemen  who  have  the  charge  of  the  State  hospitals 
for  the  insane.  We  doubt  not  they  are  honorable  and 
conscientious  men  ;  but  they  are  men.  The  constitu 
tion  of  such  a  court  of  review  must,  we  think,  be  ad 
mitted  to  be  an  anomaly  in  our  legislation,  and  no  less 
an  anomaly  that  interested  parties,  however  honorable 
and  trustworthy,  should  be  empowered  to  decide  in  their 
own  case.  And  perhaps  it  is  worth  observing  that, 
while  a  lunatic  may  be  thus  summarily  removed  from 


31 6  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

the  hospital  to  the  prison,  by  the  simple  fiat  of  the  hos 
pital  authorities  alone,  a  lunatic  could  not  so  readily  be 
removed  from  the  penitentiary  to  the  hospital.  For  this 
purpose  the  law  of  1852  presented  a  complex  process. 
In  order  that  a  lunatic  might  be  removed  from  the 
penitentiary  to  the  hospital,  the  law  provided  that  not 
only  the  inspectors  of  the  penitentiary — honorable  and 
conscientious  men — should  judge  the  continued  con 
finement  of  such  lunatic  in  the  penitentiary  to  be  im 
proper,  and  his  removal  to  the  State  lunatic  asylum 
necessary  to  his  restoration,  but  the  case  must  also  be 
submitted  to  a  board  composed  of  the  district  attorney 
and  either  two  superintendents  of  insane  asylums  or  a 
competent  physician  or  physicians  to  be  appointed  by 
the  court  of  quarter  sessions.  Nor  was  their  certificate 
of  approval  sufficient  to  secure  the  object ;  but  that  cer 
tificate  must  be  transmitted  to  the  governor,  and,  if  he 
approved,  he  might  order  the  removal.  So  careful  was 
the  law  in  that  case  to  guard  the  process  against  abuse. 
But  we  may  be  asked  why  should  we  cavil  at  what 
may  be  considered  a  theoretic  anomaly,  while  it  ac 
complishes  the  best  results,  and  is  the  shortest  and 
best  way  of  accomplishing  them  ?  We  answer  by  ask 
ing  in  return,  what  have  been  the  results  ?  Have  the 
courts,  by  them,  been  encouraged  to  send  lunatics  to 
the  hospital,  or,  on  the  contrary,  have  they  found  that 
this  is  too  often  a  roundabout  way  of  sending  them  to 
prison  ?  But  why  is  it  that  for  more  than  twenty  years 
the  law  has  existed  for  sending  certain  lunatics  from 
the  penitentiaries  to  the  hospital,  and  yet  the  experi 
ment  of  doing  so  has  been  tried  in  the  eastern  district 
of  the  State  but  once, — indeed,  has  not  been  tried  at 


CARE    OF   THE  INSANE.  317 

all  in  that  district  for  full  twenty  years  past  ?  Is  it  said 
that  lunatics  so  transmitted  very  soon  make  their  es 
cape  ?  But  if  the  hospital  is  by  law  to  receive  such 
lunatics,  some  part  of  it  ought  manifestly  to  be  so  con 
structed  and  arranged  as  to  be  suitable  for  their  safe 
keeping,  as  has  been  done  without  difficulty  or  oppo 
sition  in  the  hospitals  of  several  other  States.  Have 
the  hospital  authorities  sought  to  provide  such  con 
struction  and  arrangements,  in  order  that  the  ends  of 
the  law  might  not  be  defeated  ?  Or,  have  they  not 
rather  sought  and  obtained  the  counter-provisions  of 
the  law  of  1861,  authorizing  them  to  send  all  such 
lunatics  back  to  prison  ?  Since  which  time  it  has  been 
hardly  thought  worth  while  to  commit  any  such  to  their 
care.  Indeed,  it  has  been  trumphantly  said,  on  ap 
parently  good  authority  (see  Journal  of  Insanity,  Oc 
tober,  1873,  page  214),  that,  after  the  first  experiment, 
i.  e.,  before  the  law  of  1861,  as  well  as  since,  the  board 
of  trustees  of  the  State  Lunatic  Hospital,  at  Harris- 
burg,  declined  receiving  any  more  cases.  That  is  to 
say,  the  board  of  trustees  decided  the  question  by  their 
sole  and  ultimate  authority — commission  or  no  commis 
sion — law  or  no  law.  We  do  not  vouch  for  the  fact, 
but  it  has  been  publicly  so  stated,  without  dissent,  in 
the  presence  of  the  superintendent  of  the  lunatic 
asylum.  We  presume  the  refusal,  if  made,  was  a 
mere  declaration  and  not  an  act ;  but  the  statement, 
however  interpreted,  is  highly  suggestive.  The  act  of 
1852  is  still  the  law  of  the  land ;  a  law  whose  ends  are 
eminently  politic,  just,  and  humane;  but  can  the  author 
ities  of  the  State  hospital  be  counted  upon  as  ready 
cordially  to  concur  in  carrying  out  the  provisions  of 
that  law,  for  the  accomplishment  of  those  ends  ? 


318  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

The  views  of  the  judges  df  our  criminal  courts  and 
of  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  State,  upon  present  legis 
lation  in  regard  to  the  insane  poor  and  the  insane 
criminal,  will  appear  in  their  petitions  to  the  legisla 
ture,  which  we  here  introduce:— 

"  To  the  Legislature  of  the  State  of  Pennsylvania  : 

"  The  judges  of  the  criminal  courts  being  greatly 
embarrassed  under  the  law  of  1836,  in  the  disposal  of 
persons  charged  with  crime,  who  were  acquitted  on  the 
ground  of  insanity,  being  obliged  to  commit  them  to 
'close  custody' ;  the  jails  and  penitentiaries  being  alone 
open  to  them,  memorialized  the  legislature  in  1839,  in 
behalf  of  the  establishment  of  a  hospital  for  the  '  insane 
poor,'  and  denounced  the  commitment  of  the  ir 
responsible  insane  to  the  prisons  of  the  State.  By 
such  influence  and  other  humane  and  rightful  effort, 
the  legislature,  in  1845,  established  the  State  Lunatic 
Hospital  at  Harrisburg,  under  a  law  which  gave  proper 
protection  to  the  rights  of  the  *  poor '  and  the  '  crimi 
nal  insane.'  This  legislation  satisfied  the  judges  who 
bore  the  responsibility  of  disposing  of  such  persons, 
and  was  also  a  clear  exponent  of  the  public  mind  on 
the  subject. 

"  By  more  recent  legislation,  namely,  by  the  act  of 
April  8th,  1861,  the  courts,  having  jurisdiction  of  such 
cases,  are  forbidden  to  send  them  to  the  State  hos 
pitals,  however  irresponsible  for  crime,  unless  *  speedily 
curable,'  if  they  are  deemed  dangerous  persons  to  be  at 
large ;  and  in  every  case  where  a  lunatic  may  have 
been  sent  to  the  State  hospital,  after  an  acquittal  of 
any  crime  on  the  ground  of  insanity,  the  authorities  of 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  319 

such  hospital  may  send  such  persons  to  a  penitentiary  or 
jail,  at  the  expense  of  the  county  where  he  belongs, 
unless  they  deem  the  case  'speedily  curable.'  Sub 
stantially  the  same  provisions  are  contained  in  the  act 
of  April,  1863,  relating  to  the  western  part  of  the 
State.  The  undersigned,  regarding  the  provisions  of 
the  acts  of  1861  and  1863,  above  cited,  as  an  obstruc 
tion  to  the  ends  of  justice  ;  and,  being  greatly  embar 
rassed  in  our  administration  of  such  causes,  respectfully 
beg  that  the  legislation  be  repealed,  or  such  amend 
ments  made  as  will  relieve  from  unjust  and  injurious 
imprisonment  with  felons  the  irresponsible  class  re 
ferred  to,  and  which  will  also  protect  the  'insane  poor' 
in  their  rights,  and  enable  the  courts  to  comply  with  the 
laws,  without  violating  a  sense  of  right  or  a  sentiment 
of  humanity. 

"The  act  of  April,  1863,  in  relation  to  the  commit 
ment  of  the  insane  to  the  Western  Pennsylvania  Hos 
pital,  provides  for  the  return  of  insane  criminals  and 
persons  acquitted  on  the  ground  of  insanity,  to  the 
jail  or  penitentiary,  if  deemed  incurable. 

"Jos.  ALLISON, 
U]AS.  R.  LUDLOW, 
"\¥M.  S.  PEIRCE, 

"TlIOS.    A.    FlNLETTER, 

"  EDWARD  M.  PAXSON, 
"  Judges  of  Court  of  Quarter  Sessions,  Philadelphia  Co. 

"  F.  H.  COLLIER, 

"  JAMES  P.  STERRETT, 

"  EDWIN  H.  STOWE, 
"Judges  of  Court  of  Quarter  Sessions  of  Allegheny  Co" 


320  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

"  We  concur  in  the  foregoing  recommendation. 

"  GEO.  SHARSWOOD, 
"  HENRY  W.  WILLIAMS, 
"JoHN  M.  READ, 
"  DANIEL  AGNEW, 
"  ULYSSES  MERCUR, 

"  Judges  of  Supreme  Court. 
"November  28th,  1873." 

We  turn  to  another  description  of  the  insane — to 
those  who,  without  any  charge  or  suggestion  of  crime, 
have,  either  as  dangerous  or  simply  as  helpless  luna 
tics,  been  placed  in  the  county  poor-houses.  These 
may  by  law  be  committed  by  the  county  authorities  to 
the  State  hospitals  for  the  insane.  How  many  of  them 
have  been  so  committed  ?  Does  the  management  of 
these  hospitals  encourage  and  stimulate  the  authorities 
to  send  them  there  ?  They  need  encouragement  and 
stimulus  ;  for,  as  experience  too  constantly  shows,  those 
authorities  are  extremely  liable  to  be  led  by  the  con 
siderations  of  a  false  and  short-sighted  economy,  to 
endeavor  to  make  a  cheaper  provision  for  the  care  and 
maintenance  of  their  insane  than  that  furnished  by  the 
hospital.  -Are  those  whom  they  actually  commit  sent 
back  to  them  again,  with  a  charge  for  the  expense  of 
both  transfers  ?  If  so,  by  the  authority  of  what  law 
are  they  sent  back  ?  What  law  provides  that  the 
authorities  of  the  hospitals  may  send  any  of  their 
patients,  or  allow  any  of  their  patients,  however  violent 
or  incurable,  to  be  taken  to  a  county  poor-house  ?  Yet 
the  simple  fact  is  that  while  there  are  some  five  hun 
dred  of  the  insane  poor  in  our  hospitals,  sent  from  the 


CARE    OF   THE  INSANE.  321 

county  almshouses,  there  are  more  than  twice  that 
number  raving  or  languishing  in  our  county  poor- 
houses,  an  incarceration  much  better  fitted  to  make  a 
sane  man  mad,  than  a  madman  sane.  And  of  the  two, 
if  there  is  less  disgrace,  there  is  also,  in  a  majority  of 
cases,  less  chance  for  comfort,  and  no  better  chance  for 
,  recovery,  in  the  poor-house  than  in  the  prison.  So 
that  it  may  be  said  upon  a  deliberate  calculation,  to  be 
better,  as  regards  comfort  and  a  prospect  of  resto 
ration,  for  an  insane  person  to  be  convicted  of  crime, 
and  sentenced  to  the  penitentiary  for  a  definite  time, 
than,  as  an  innocent  lunatic,  to  be  imprisoned  in  the 
poor-house.  But  we  may  add  that  the  great  and  irre- 
mediable  defect  in  both  the  prison  and  the  poor-house, 
but  especially  in  the  latter,  is  the  want  of  proper 
attendance  and  of  skillful  medical  care.  These  poor 
creatures  are  not  expected  to  recover.  They  are  given 
over  to  utter  hopelessness. 

And  now,  what  is  to  be  done  ?  To  this  question  we 
would  address  ourselves  with  the  full  appreciation  of 
the  many  and  formidable  difficulties  with  which  the 
subject  is  encompassed.  But  we  believe  that  there  is 
no  thoughtful  person,  who  has  made  himself  practically 
acquainted  with  the  facts,  that  does  not  fully  concur  in 
the  judgment  that  no  poor-house  can  be  a  proper  re 
ceptacle  for  the  insane.  We  shall  enter  into  no  argu 
ment,  therefore,  to  show  that  all  the  insane  poor  now 
gathered  in  the  county  poor-houses  should,  as  soon  as 
possible,  be  provided  for  in  State  lunatic  hospitals, 
and  transferred  to  them,  to  be  there  supported  as  the 
law  may  direct,  unless  any  particular  county  has  popu 
lation  enough,  and  insane  poor  enough,  to  render  it 


322  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

advisable  and  feasible  to  establish  and  maintain  a 
separate  hospital  for  itself,  with  the  full  appointments 
and  provisions  for  the  best  and  most  skillful  care  and 
medical  treatment  of  the  inmates,  with  a  view  both  to 
their  comfort  and  their  care,  as  well  as  to  the  safety  of 
the  community. 

As  to  the  other,  less  numerous,  class,  who  have  been 
committed  by  the  courts  (or  by  the  hospital  authorities) 
to  the  jails  or  the  penitentiaries,  including  (i)  those  who, 
having  been  charged  with  the  most  heinous  felonies, 
have  been  acquitted  on  the  ground  of  insanity;  (2)  those 
who,  on  the  same  ground,  have  been  acquitted  of  any 
offense  whatever,  and  however  slight ;  (3)  those  who 
have  been  indicted  for  any  offense,  and,  upon  being 
brought  up  for  trial,  have  been  found  insane  ;  (4)  those 
who,  when  brought  up  to  be  discharged  for  want  of 
prosecution,  have  been  found  insane  ;  (5)  those  who, 
though  never  charged  with  any  act  of  crime  or  harm 
whatever,  have  been  judged  dangerous  if  allowed  to 
go  at  large  ;  as  well  as  (6)  those  who,  having  been  con 
victed  of  crime,  committed  while  they  were  presumed 
to  be  sane,  have  since  become  lunatics, — in  regard  to 
all  these,  it  seems  now  to  be  universally  conceded  that 
the  jail  or  the  penitentiary  is  not  the  proper  place  for 
their  cure  and  detention. 

The  practical  question  then  is,  what  other  provision 
is  to  be  made  for  them  ? 

The  act  of  May  4th,  1852,  had,  as  we  have  seen, 
provided  that  any  of  the  prisoners  confined  in  the 
Eastern  Penitentiary,  being  found  insane  (thus,  insane 
convicts  as  well,  but  not  insane  convicts  only)  might, 
by  a  certain  process,  be  removed  to  the  State  Lunatic 


CARE    OF   THE  INSANE.  323 

Asylum.  In  their  report  of  the  year  following,  the  in 
spectors  of  the  penitentiary  inform  us  that  of  eighteen 
persons  proposed  by  them  as  candidates  for  removal, 
eight  had  been  so  transferred  by  order  of  the  gov 
ernor,  and  they  add  : — 

"  The  inspectors  cannot  omit  this  opportunity  of 
again  calling  upon  the  general  assembly,  should  the 
means  provided  for  this  object  be  found  in  any  way 
inadequate,  either  in  the  terms  of  the  law  authorizing 
the  removal,  or  in  the  provision  for  the  safe-keeping  in 
the  lunatic  hospital,  not  to  halt  in  the  good  work  until 
it  is  carried  into  full  effect.  Let  it  no  longer  rest  upon 
the  fair  fame  of  Pennsylvania,  who  claims  to  be  fore 
most  in  the  work  of  penitentiary  reforms,  that  insane 
men  are  imprisoned  in  the  cells  of  her  penitentiary  for 
long  years  or  for  life.  Surely,  in 

this  enlightened  Christian  age  and  country,  the  cells 
of  the  penitentiary  should  cease  to  be  the  abode  of 
human  beings  without  moral  perceptions  or  responsi 
bilities  to  fit  them  for  the  salutary  effects  of  either  peni 
tentiary  punishments  or  moral  reform.  The  inspectors 
have  gone  more  fully  into  this  subject  than  they  other 
wise  would  have  done,  from  the  fact  that  a  State  hos 
pital  has  been  put  into  operation  by  the  legislature  for 
this  enlightened  and  benevolent  purpose.  Its  estab 
lishment  has  been  long  needed." 

In  their  report  for  the  next  year  (1854),  the  inspect 
ors  remark  that  "  the  eight  persons  before  alluded  to 
were  the  first  so  removed  since  the  opening  of  the 
prison,  twenty-five  years  ago,  as  until  last  year  no  in 
stitution  existed  in  Pennsylvania,  as  in  other  States, 
for  the  reception  and  treatment  of  persons  who,  though 


324  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

insane,  required  punitive  restraint.  No  other  cases 
have  since  occurred  requiring  removal  from  the  peni 
tentiary.  The  State  Lunatic  Hospital  is  an  establish 
ment  of  the  highest  utility, — its  purpose  approved  by 
the  most  enlightened  benevolence  and  sound  policy. 
Every  humane  mind  cannot  but  hope  that  it  will  be 
fostered  and  encouraged  for  the  accomplishment  of 
benefits  to  an  increasing  class  of  unfortunate  people." 
They  then  proceed  to  a  class  who  are  sometimes  in 
cluded  among  the  "  criminal  insane,"  in  the  following 
terms : — "  As  yet  no  complete  provisions  have  been 
made  for  the  reception  and  treatment  of  those  insane 
who  are  sentenced  to  restraint  of  their  liberty,  because 
the  fact  of  their  unsound  mind  renders  them  irrespon 
sible  for  the  crimes  charged  against  them.  There  are 
now  four  prisoners  in  the  penitentiary  thus  confined  ; 
their  dangerous  character,  arising  from  homicidal 
mania,  rendering  them  unsafe,  unless  under  a  cautious 
restraint.  As  they  are  in  the  penitentiary  not  as  con 
victs,  but  here  retained  because  of  no  other  place  of 
equal  security,  it  is  difficult  properly  to  treat  them  for 
the  confirmed  malady  under  which  they  labor.  The 
time  will  come  when,  in  the  State  hospital,  provision 
can  be  made  for  this  class  of  insane." 

Nearly  twenty  years  have  elapsed,  and  these  poor, 
wretched  beings  are  still  in  jails  and  almshouses. 

The  inspectors  making  the  report  in  1853  were 
John  Bacon,  Richard  Vaux,  Hugh  Campbell,  Singleton 
A.  Mercer,  and  Charles  Brown;  in  1854,  Messrs. 
Bacon,  Vaux,  Mercer,  Andrew  Miller,  and  Charles 
McKibben. 

Then   came  the   law  of  1861,  which  empowers  the 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  325 

trustees  and  physician  of  the  State  Lunatic  Asylum  to 
send  insane  persons,  committed  to  the  hospital  by 
the  courts,  or  removed  to  it  from  the  penitentiary, 
back  to  the  penitentiary  from  which  they  were  sent, 
or  to  a  prison  to  which  they  were  not  committed 
by  the  courts,  when  there  appeared  no  reasonable 
prospect  of  a  cure.  The  result  is,  that  it  is  found 
a  useless  expenditure  of  pains  and  money,  in  many 
cases,  for  the  courts  to  send  to  the  hospitals  insane 
men  acquitted  of  crime,  and  always  for  the  peni 
tentiary  to  remove  thither  its  prisoners  or  insane  con 
victs,  while  authority  resides  in  the  hospital  forthwith  to 
send  them  back  again.  In  anticipation  of  this  result, 
the  inspectors  of  the  Eastern  Penitentiary,  in  their  re 
port  of  the  following  year  (1862),  " respectfully  suggest 
to  the  legislature  that  provisions  by  law  be  made  re 
quiring  the  State  Lunatic  Asylum  to  take  insane  persons 
convicted  of  crime  into  that  institution."  And,  in  1863, 
"  the  inspectors  again  ask  the  legislature  to  require 
the  State  Lunatic  Asylum  to  take  '  insane  convicts.' ' 
The  inspectors  in  1862  and  1863  were  Richard  Vaux, 
Samuel  Jones,  M.  D.,  Alexander  Henry,  Thomas  H. 
Powers,  and  Furman  Sheppard. 

It  is  plain  that  these  gentlemen,  as  well  as  the  inspect 
ors  of  1853  and  1854,  judged  it  to  be  the  wisest  and 
most  desirable  plan,  in  this  as  in  other  States,  that  pro 
visions  should  be  made  for  the  criminal  insane  and 
even  for  insane  convicts  in  connection  with  the  State 
hospital  rather  than  with  the  State  penitentiary. 

We  append  here,  without  comment,  as  the  docu 
ments  tell  their  own  story  very  clearly,  the  communica 
tions  to  this  board  from  the  inspectors  of  the  Eastern 


326  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

and  Western  Penitentiaries,  requesting  its  intervention 
with  the  legislature  for  the  modification  or  repeal  of 
the  obnoxious  laws  against  the  rights  of  the  insane 
which  now  disgrace  our  statute-books. 

"NOVEMBER  26th,  1873. 
"  To  the  Board  of  Public  Charities  : 

"The  inspectors  of  the  State  Penitentiary  for  the 
Eastern  District  of  Pennsylvania  have  heretofore  in 
their  reports  called  the  attention  of  the  legislature  to 
the  deplorable  condition  of  the  insane  committed  to 
the  custody  of  that  institution,  and  have  suggested 
legislation  which  would  relieve  us  from  the  pressure  of 
a  duty  which  we  could  not  fulfill  in  providing  for  them 
proper  care  and  medical  treatment,  and  which  also 
would  provide  for  these  defenseless  and,  for  the  most 
part,  irresponsible  persons,  a  more  rightful  and  suitable 
abode  than  a  prison.  We  now  most  respectfully  appeal 
to  the  legislature,  through  your  board,  to  so  amend 
the  legislation  of  the  act  of  April  8th,  1861,  as  will  give 
effect  to  the  former  representations  of  the  inspectors, 
and  place  the  class  of  the  'poor  insane'  and  the  'crimi 
nal  insane '  in  the  more  just  and  favorable  position 
which  they  occupied  under  the  law  of  April  I4th,  1845, 
which  established  the  State  Lunatic  Asylum  at  Harris- 
burg. 

"  RICHARD  VAUX, 

"THOMAS  H.  POWERS, 
"ALEX.   HENRY, 
"  CHARLES  THOMSON  JONES, 
"JOHN  M.  MARIS." 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  327 

"  To  the  Board  of  Public  Charities  : 

"The  inspectors  of  the  Western  Penitentiary  desire 
to  call  the  attention  of  the  legislature,  through  your 
board,  to  the  necessity  of  further  and  fuller  provision 
by  law  for  the  care  and  protection  of  the  indigent  and 
criminal  insane. 

"  In  many  of  the  annual  reports  of  this  penitentiary, 
attention  has  been  directed  to  the  fact  that  insane  per 
sons  have  been  convicted  of  crime  and  sent  to  prison. 
The  following,  from  our  report  for  1867,  briefly  states 
the  facts  in  the  case,  and  in  its  conclusions,  we  trust, 
will  receive  your  earnest  co-operation  :— 

"We  would  ask  the  attention  of  the  legislature  to 
the  great  necessity  there  is  for  such  legislation  as  will 
secure  to  the  insane  convict  a  place  in  some  State  in 
stitution  where  he  may  be  properly  cared  for.  By 
special  amended  enactments  of  the  law  on  this  subject, 
no  insane  convict  who  has  been  committed  to  prison  on 
the  higher  grades  of  crime,  can  be  transferred  to  the 
hospital  at  Dixmont,  'unless  by  the  verdict  of  the  jury  in 
the  case  there  is  reason  to  believe  that  a  cure  of  such 
insanity  may  be  speedily  effected.' 

"  If  this  institution  is  intended  only  for  the  benefit  of 
the  curably  insane,  what  is  to  become  of  the  ill-fated 
wretch  who  has  no  helper,  and  whose  reason  is  declared 
to  be  'clean  gone  forever.'  ' 

"  We  hold  that  it  is  the  duty  of  the  State  to  make 
some  speedy  provision  for  his  relief,  either  by  the 
modification  of  existing  laws,  or  the  enactment  of  such 


328  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

statutes  as  will  guarantee  to  him  a  humane  and  Chris 
tian  protection. 

"T.  H.  NEVIN, 

"  ROBERT  H.  DAVIS, 

"JoHN  DEAN, 

"  GEORGE  A.  KELLY, 

"  ORMSBY  PHILLIPS, 

"  Inspectors" 

In  like  manner  the  secretary  of  the  Massachusetts 
Board  of  State  Charities,  in  his  report  for  1871,  re 
commends,  and  in  that  for  1872  renews  the  recommen 
dation,  that  a  special  "  receptacle  or  institution  be 
provided  for  insane  convicts,  and  for  insane  persons  who, 
in  a  state  of  insanity,  have  committed  or  are  disposed 
to  commit  violent  acts ;"  for  which  he  gives  his  reasons  at 
large,  and  then  adds,  "it  is  submitted  that  the  construc 
tion  of  such  a  receptacle  may  perhaps  be  wisely  made 
a  part  of  the  plan  for  a  new  hospital  at  Worcester.  It 
can  be  made  a  separate  building,  surrounded  by  a  wall, 
sufficiently  removed  from  other  buildings  to  avoid  any 
unpleasant  associations,  and  yet  near  enough  to  have 
the  benefit  of  the  general  superintendence  of  that  in 
stitution." 

That  is  to  say,  as  the  secretary  immediately  adds, 
the  project  of  a  new  and  (totally)  separate  institution 
for  the  class  referred  to,  is  sure  to  start  some  vexed 
question,  with  which  it  would  not  be  well  to  embarrass 
the  desired  improvement.  The  "convict  insane  "  would 
give  to  it  its  distinctive  character,  and  then  any  propo 
sition  to  admit  to  it  others,  not  "convict  insane,"  who 
could  be  better  provided  for  in  it  than  elsewhere,  would 


CARE    OF   THE  INSANE.  329 

* 

be  resisted,  as  affixing  to  them  the  repute  of  a  criminal 
class.  Nor  is  it  likely  that  it  would,  with  its  peculiar 
character,  as  well  as  it  smaller  numbers,  be  provided, 
in  the  long  run,  with  a  corps  of  officers  equal  in  skill 
to  those  whose  services  are  commanded  by  the  other 
hospitals.  "For  these  and  other  reasons,  it  is  better 
that  provision  should  be  made  for  the  insane,  who  have 
committed  or  are  predisposed  to  homicidal  or  violent 
acts,  in  buildings  or  apartments,  properly  arranged  and 
provided  with  means  of  security,  in  connection  with 
some  one  of  the  lunatic  hospitals." 

So  much  from  the  secretary.  The  board  itself,  in  its 
first  report,  had  said,  "  there  is  still  another  class,  the 
'criminal  insane,'  for  whom  special  provision  should  be 
made.  Formerly  they  were  kept  in  the  prisons,  con 
fined  in  cells;  but  more  recently  they  have  been  placed 
in  the  State  hospitals.  It  is  generally  thought  that  this 
class  of  the  insane  should  not  be  allowed  to  mingle 
with  those  who  are  free  from  crime,  but  should  have 
apartments  built  expressly  for  their  accommodation. 
The  most  appropriate  plan  for  an  asylum,  designed  for 
this  class  of  insane  persons,  would  probably  be  at  one 
of  the  State  hospitals." 

The  same  subject  was  again  referred  to  in  their  fifth 
and  sixth  reports ;  and  again  it  is  added,  if  a  proper 
building  for  "insane  convicts"  and  others  predisposed 
to  violent  acts  should  be  provided  in  connection  with  one 
of  the  State  lunatic  hospitals,  "power  should  be  given 
to  this  board  to  transfer  from  the  other  hospitals  to  the 
one  where  such  provision  is  made,  persons  of  the  class 
referred  to."  "  From  the  other  hospitals,"  observe — 
not  "from  the  prisons," — in  Massachusetts  there  are 


330  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

no   "insane   criminals,"   nor  "  insane   convicts"  in  the 
prisons. 

We  have  referred  to  the  injurious  and  wrongful 
effects  of  the  act  of  1861,  and  we  have  seen  the 
earnest  counter-recommendations  of  the  inspectors  of 
the  Eastern  Penitentiary  and  other  just  and  honorable 
authorities.  We  have  ourselves  already  pointed  out 
the  disastrous  consequences  of  that  act ;  and  now,  to 
confirm  our  position,  we  beg  leave  to  insert  here  the 
results  of  the  experience  and  research,  and  the  carefully- 
drawn  statements  of  Judge  Brewster  on  this  point, 
conveyed  to  us  in  a  letter  dated  October  loth,  1873. 

"No.  214  WEST  WASHINGTON  SQUARE, 

"PHILADELPHIA,  October  loth,  1873. 

"  To  Hon.  George  L.  Harrison, 

"  President  of  the  Board  of  Public  Charities, 

"DEAR  SIR: — Your  communication  of  August  I4th, 
in  reference  to  '  insane  criminals,'  was  duly  received 
and  acknowledged. 

"With  your  permission,  the  examination  of  the 
authorities  which  you  desired  was  postponed  until  a 
recent  date. 

"  I  have  considered  with  some  care  the  question  you 
propound,  and  the  several  acts  of  assembly  to  which 
you  referred  me.  I  was  induced  to  do  this,  not  only 
because  of  the  respect  due  to  your  letter,  but  also  be 
cause  of  the  peculiar  interest  which  ever  attaches  to 
the  subject  of  the  treatment  of  persons  afflicted  with 
the  peculiar  and  distressing  calamity  of  insanity. 

"  Your  favor  refers  me  to  a  passage  which  is  to  be 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  331 

found  in  a  communication  addressed  by  your  board  to 
the  public. 

"  As  you  invite  a  statement  of  my  opinion  as  to  its 
accuracy,  it  is  proper  that  I  should  quote  it  at  length ; 
it  is  in  these  words  :— 

" '  The  sad  and  anomalous  condition  of  "  insane 
criminals  "  under  the  provisions  of  the  act  of  1836, 
relating  to  this  class,  did  not  satisfy  the  public  mind, 
little  as  the  public  mind  takes  cognizance  of  such  mat 
ters,  and  it  found  in  Miss  Dix  such  an  exponent  of  its 
wishes  as  led  to  the  legislation  of  1845,  which  estab 
lished  the  State  Lunatic  Hospital  at  Harrisburg,  at 
which  provision  was  made  for  the  reception  of  this  class 
of  the  insane  in  community  with  the  other  patients.  So 
largely  did  this  feature  interest  the  public,  that  it  was 
the  common  thought  that  this  institution  was  created 
for  the  special  care  of  this  class.  The  act  of  1861 
practically  nullified  this  legislation,  and  since  then  a 
great  wrong  has  been  imposed  upon  them,  which  this 
board  is  endeavoring  to  remove.  Very  many  of  them 
are  consigned  to  the  public  jails.  While  wholly  irre 
sponsible  in  the  eyes  of  the  law,  they  are  dealt  with  by 
the  law  as  convicted  criminals.  We  maintain  that, 
under  the  law  of  1861,  the  wisdom  and  humanity  of 
our  able  and  excellent  judges  are  not  competent  to 
make  any  other  disposition  of  them.' 

"  You  ask  me  to  give  my  '  professional  opinion  upon 
the  accuracy  of  the  statement '  just  quoted. 

"Save  for  your  request,  which  implies  that  some  one 
has  ventured  to  doubt  the  correctness  of  your  narra 
tive,  I  should  not  have  supposed  it  possible  that  it 
needed  confirmation. 


33 2  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

"My  first  impression  was  decidedly  in  favor  of  its 
entire  truth,  and  my  subsequent  examination  of  the 
law  has  confirmed  my  original  conviction. 

"  By  the  act  of  June  I3th,  1836,  it  was  provided  that 
upon  the  acquittal  of  a  defendant  in  a  criminal  case 
'upon  the  ground  of  insanity,'  the  court  should  have 
the  'power  to  order  such  a  person  to  be  kept  in  strict 
custody,  in  such  place  and  manner  as  *  * 

should  seem  fit  so  long  as  such 

person  should  continue  to  be  of  unsound  mind.'  (Act 
of  June  1 3th,  1836,  section  58,  P.  L.,  1836,  page  603.) 

"The  like  proceedings  were  authorized  if  the  de 
fendant  were  upon  arraignment  found  to  be  a  lunatic 
and  even  where  he  was  about  to  be  discharged  for 
want  of  prosecution. 

"Prior  to  1841  there  was  no  place  in  which  such 
unfortunate  persons  could  be  'kept  in  strict  custody,' 
except  prisons  and  penitentiaries.  The  private  asy 
lums  were  evidently  not  contemplated  by  the  law,  and 
were  probably  under  no  obligation  to  receive  any 
person  sent  to  them  by  the  courts. 

"March  4th,  1841,  Governor  Porter  approved  an 
act  '  to  establish  an  asylum  for  the  insane  of  this  Com 
monwealth.'  This  statute  reflects  great  credit  upon 
the  gentleman  who  drafted  it  and  upon  the  legislature 
and  the  governor  who  passed  and  approved  of  it.  It 
established  '  a  public  asylum  for  the  reception  and 
relief  of  the  insane  of  this  Commonwealth.'  The 
governor  was  to  appoint  three  commissioners  to  pur 
chase  a  site  and  to  erect  a  building  for  the  accommo 
dation  of  three  hundred  patients  and  necessary  offices, 
at  an  expense  not  exceeding  $120,000. 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  333 

"The  eighth  section  of  said  act  was  designed  to 
remedy  the  evil  you  refer  to  as  existing  under  the 
statute  of  1836.  It  provided: — 

" '  That  the  proper  courts  of  this  Commonwealth 
shall  have  power  to  commit  to  said  asylum  any  person 
who,  having  been  charged  with  an  offense  punishable 
by  imprisonment  or  death,  shall  have  been  declared  by 
the  verdict  of  a  jury  or  otherwise,  to  the  satisfaction  of 
the  court,  to  have  been  insane  at  the  time  the  offense 
was  committed  and  who  still  continues  insane.' 

"The  prior  act  of  1751  had  contained  no  such  pro 
vision.  The  act  of  1841  removed  the  blot  upon  our 
system  of  confining  insane  persons  as  criminals. 

"  So  far  as  I  have  been  able  to  discover,  there  was 
no  change  in  this  system  for  many  years.  It  evidently 
met  with  the  support  of  the  people.  By  act  approved 
by  Governor  Shunk,  April  I4th,  1845,  a  hospital  was 
established  at  Harrisburg  (P.  L.,  1845,  Page  442)- 

"The  tenth  section  of  this  statute  repeats  the  hu 
mane  provision  of  the  act  of  1841. 

"March  iSth,  1848,  Governor  Shunk  approved  the 
act  incorporating  the  Pittsburg  Hospital.  (P.  L.,  1848, 
page  218.)  By  a  supplement  to  this  charter,  approved 
by  Governor  Pollock,  May  8th,  1855  (P.  L.,  1855,  page 
512),  the  provisions  of  the  act  of  1841  were  extended 
to  that  institution. 

"Provisions  for  the  removal  of  insane  persons  from 
prisons  and  penitentiaries  were  repeated  by  the  acts  of 
May  4th,  1852  (P.  L.,  1852,  page  552),  and  March  24th, 
1858  (P.  L.,  1858,  page  151). 

"So  the  law  stood  from  1841  to  1861.  During 
those  twenty  years  the  courts  and  all  classes  of  citizens 


334  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

were  satisfied  with  the  propriety,  justice,  and  necessity 
of  these  laws. 

"April  8th,  1861,  a  statute  was  approved  which  pro 
hibited  the  commitment  to  the  Pennsylvania  State 
Lunatic  Asylum  of  any  person  charged  with  certain 
crimes  enumerated.  It,  however,  contained  a  humane 
proviso  which  left  the  power  of  commitment  with  the 
courts  where  they  were  satisfied  that  there  was  'reason 
to  believe  that  a  cure  of  insanity  might  be  speedily 
effected'  (P.  L.,  1861,  page  249).  But  a  subsequent 
section  authorizes  the  trustees  and  the  superintending 
physician  to  reverse  the  order  of  the  court,  for  if  they 
are  *  satisfied  that  there  is  no  reasonable  prospect  of  a 
cure'  '  they  may  in  all  cases  cause 

the  patient  to  be  removed  to  the  prison  of  the  proper 
county  or  the  penitentiary  from  which  he  or  she  was 
sent.' 

"It  is  therefore  unfortunately  true,  as  stated  by  you, 
that  the  act  of  1861  practically  nullifies  the  humane 
legislation  of  former  years,  and  that  since  1861  a  great 
wrong  has  been  imposed  upon  a  class  of  unfortunate 
persons  who,  although  not  responsible  to  the  law,  are 
yet  subject  to  confinement  in  prisons  and  penitentiaries 
as  felons.  These  views  are  not  affected  in  any  wise 
by  the  act  of  April  2Oth,  1869  (P.  L.,  78),  for  the 
officers  of  the  State  asylums  are  not  embraced  within 
its  provisions.  The  act  of  1861  stands  unrepealed. 

"  I  am,  very  respectfully,  yours, 

"F.  CARROLL  BREWSTER." 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  335 

In  a  large  number  of  our  sister  States  constitutional 
provision  has  been  made  to  secure  appropriate  legisla 
tion  in  behalf  of  the  insane ;  but  in  order  to  bring  the 
whole  subject  more  fully  before  the  legislature,  in  all 
its  bearings,  or,  at  least,  in  a  great  variety  of  points  of 
view,  we  take  leave  to  introduce  here  the  legislative 
provisions  of  a  number  of  States  as  to  insane  persons, 
charged  or  convicted  of  crime  ;  premising  that  we  have 
examined  the  constitution  and  laws,  together,  of  thirty- 
three  States  (all  that  we  have  been  able  to  reach),  in 
relation  to  the  insane,  and  in  all  cases  their  rights  have 
been  tenderly  protected  and  the  legislation  in  behalf  of 
the  class  to  which  we  are  now  directing  your  attention, 
with  the  single  exception  of  Pennsylvania,  is  invariably 
of  the  most  humane  character. 

LEGISLATION  OF  OTHER  STATES  IN  RELATION  TO  INSANE 

CRIMINALS. 

Arkansas. — A  person  that  becomes  insane  or  lunatic 
after  the  commission  of  a  crime  or  misdemeanor,  shall 
not  be  tried  for  the  offense  during  the  insanity  or 
lunacy. 

If,  after  verdict  of  guilty  and  before  judgment  pro 
nounced,  such  person  becomes  insane  or  lunatic,  then 
no  judgment  shall  be  given  while  the  insanity  or  lunacy 
shall  continue. 

If,  after  judgment  or  before  execution  of  the  sentence, 
such  convict  becomes  insane  or  lunatic,  if  the  punish 
ment  be  capital  or  corporal,  the  execution  thereof  shall 
be  stayed  until  the  recovery  of  such  convict  from  such 
insanity  or  lunacy. 


336  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

Connecticut. — That  section  two  hundred  and  forty- 
three  of  the  act  concerning  crimes  and  misdemeanors 
be  amended  by  erasing  from  the  fourth  line  thereof  the 
words  the  "  common  jail,"  and  inserting  in  lieu  thereof 
the  words  "  the  General  Hospital  for  the  Insane  of  the 
State  of  Connecticut." 

Georgia. — It  shall  be  the  duty  of  the  physician  to 
the  penitentiary  of  the  State,  when  he  discovers  that 
any  one  of  the  convicts  in  said  penitentiary  has  become 
lunatic  or  insane,  to  certify  the  same  to  the  principal 
keeper  of  said  penitentiary,  and  it  shall  be  the  duty  of 
said  principal  keeper,  upon  the  receipt  of  such  certifi 
cate,  to  transfer  said  convict  to  the  lunatic  asylum 
of  this  State,  and  shall  send  together  with  such  con 
vict  a  copy  of  said  certificate,  together  with  the  day  on 
which  the  term  of  service  of  such  convict  will  expire 
in  said  penitentiary,  and  the  county  from  which  he  was 
sentenced. 

Louisiana. — Whenever  any  person  arrested  to  answer 
for  any  crime  or  misdemeanor  before  any  court  of  this 
State  shall  be  acquitted  thereof  by  the  jury,  or  shall 
not  be  indicted  by  the  grand  jury,  by  reason  of  the  in 
sanity  or  mental  derangement  of  such  person,  and  the 
discharge  or  going  at  large  of  such  person  shall  be 
deemed  by  the  court  to  be  dangerous  to  the  safety  of 
the  citizens  or  to  the  peace  of  the  State,  the  court  is 
authorized  and  empowered  to  commit  such  person  to 
the  State  Insane  Hospital  or  any  similar  institution  in 
any  parish  within  the  jurisdiction  of  the  court,  there 
to  be  detained  until  he  is  restored  to  his  right  mind  or 
otherwise  delivered  by  due  course  of  law. 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  337 

Maine. — When  any  person  is  indicted  for  a  criminal 
offense,  or  is  committed  to  jail  on  a  charge  thereof  by 
a  justice  of  the  peace  or  judge  of  a  police  or  muni 
cipal  court,  any  judge  of  the  court  before  whom  he 
is  to  be  tried,  when  a  plea  of  insanity  is  made  in  court, 
or  he  is  notified  that  it  will  be  made,  may  in  vacation 
or  term  time  order  such  person  into  the  care  of  the 
superintendent  of  the  insane  hospital,  to  be  detained 
and  observed  by  him  till  the  further  order  of  the 
court,  that  the  truth  or  falsity  of  the  plea  may  be 
ascertained. 

When  the  grand  jury  omits  to  find  an  indictment 
against  any  person  arrested  by  legal  process  to  answer 
for  any  offense  by  reason  of  his  insanity,  they  shall 
certify  that  fact  to  the  court ;  and  when  a  traverse  jury 
for  the  same  reason  acquits  any  person  indicted,  they 
shall  state  that  fact  to  the  court  when  they  return  their 
verdict;  and  the  court  by  a  precept  stating  the  fact  of 
insanity,  may  commit  him  to  prison  or  to  the  insane 
hospital  till  restored  to  his  right  mind  or  delivered 
according  to  law  ;  but  he  shall  only  remain  in  prison  till 
provision  can  be  made  for  him  at  the  hospital  and  then 
removed  thereto. 

When  an  inmate  of  the  State  prison  becomes  insane, 
the  warden  shall  notify  the  governor  of  the  fact,  and 
he,  with  the  advise  of  counsel,  shall  appoint  a  commis 
sion  of  two  or  more  skillful  physicians  to  investigate 
the  case,  and  if  such  inmate  is  found  insane  by  their  in 
vestigation,  he  shall  be  sent  to  the  insane  hospital  until 
he  becomes  of  sound  mind ;  and  if  this  takes  place 
before  the  expiration  of  his  sentence,  he  shall  be  re 
turned  to  prison ;  but  if  after,  he  shall  be  discharged 


33^  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

free.     The  expenses  of  the  commission,  removal,  and 
support  shall  be  paid  by  the  State. 

Minnesota  and  Wisconsin. — When  any  person  so  in 
dicted  or  informed  against  for  an  offense,  shall  on  trial 
be  acquitted  by  the  jury  by  reason  of  insanity,  the  jury, 
in  giving  their  verdict  of  not  guilty,  shall  state  that  it 
was  given  for  such  cause,  and  thereupon,  if  the  dis 
charge  or  going  at  large  of  such  insane  person  shall 
be  considered  by  the  court  manifestly  dangerous  to  the 
peace  and  safety  of  the  community,  the  court  may  order 
him  to  be  committed  to  prison,  or  may  give  him  into 
the  care  of  his  friends,  if  they  shall  give  bonds  with 
surety,  to  the  satisfaction  of  the  court,  conditioned  that 
he  shall  be  well  and  securely  kept ;  otherwise  he  shall 
be  discharged. 

Oregon. — If  the  defense  be  the  insanity  of  the  de 
fendant,  the  jury  must  be  instructed,  if  they  find  him 
not  guilty  on  that  ground,  to  state  that  fact  in  their 
verdict,  and  the  court  must  thereupon,  if  it  deems  his 
being  at  large  dangerous  to  the  public  peace  or  safety, 
order  him  to  be  committed  to  any  lunatic  asylum 
authorized  by  the  State  to  receive  and  keep  such  per 
sons,  until  he  become  sane  or  be  otherwise  discharged 
therefrom,  by  authority  of  law.  (General  Laws,  Ore 
gon,  page  469,  section  170.) 

New  Jersey  and  New  York. — When  a  person  shall 
have  escaped  indictment  or  have  been  acquitted  of  a 
criminal  charge  upon  trial,  upon  the  ground  of  insanity, 
upon  the  plea  pleaded  of  insanity  or  otherwise,  the 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  339 

court  being  certified  by  the  jury  or  otherwise  of  the 
fact,  shall  carefully  inquire  and  ascertain  whether  his 
insanity  in  any  degree  continues,  and  if  it  does,  shall 
order  him  into  safe  custody,  and  to  be  sent  to  the 
asylum. 

If  any  person  in  confinement,  under  indictment  or 
under  sentence  of  imprisonment,  or  for  want  of  bail 
for  good  behavior  shall  appear  to 

be  insane,  the  judge  of  the  circuit  court  of  the  county 
where  he  is  confined  shall  institute  a  careful  investiga 
tion,  call  two  respectable  witnesses,  physicians,  and 
other  credible  witnesses,  invite  the  prosecutor  of  the 
pleas  to  aid  in  the  examination,  and,  if  he  shall  deem 
it  necessary,  call  a  jury,  and  for  that  purpose  is  fully 
empowered  to  compel  the  attendance  of  witnesses  and 
jurors,  and  if  it  be  satisfactorily  proved  that  he  is  insane, 
said  judge  may  discharge  him  from  imprisonment,  and 
order  his  safe  custody  and  removal  to  the  asylum, 
where  he  shall  remain  until  restored  to  his  right  mind, 
and  then,  if  the  said  judge  shall  have  so  directed,  the 
superintendent  shall  inform  the  said  judge  and  the 
county  clerk  and  prosecutor  of  the  pleas  thereof, 
whereupon  he  shall  be  remanded  to  prison,  and  crimi 
nal  proceedings  be  resumed,  or  otherwise  be  dis 
charged. 

Persons  charged  with  misdemeanors  and  acquitted 
on  the  ground  of  insanity  may  be  kept  in  custody  and 
sent  to  the  asylum  in  the  same  way  as  persons  charged 
with  crime. 

New  York. — An  act  to  organize  the  State  lunatic 
asylum  for  insane  convicts  passed  April  8th,  1858. 


34°  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

SECTION  i.  The  building  now  being  erected  on  the 
prison  grounds  at  Auburn,  for  an  asylum  for  insane 
convicts,  shall  be  known  and  designated  as  the  " State 
lunatic  asylum  for  insane  convicts." 

[After  defining  the  method  of  administration,  the 
statute  proceeds  : — ] 

SEC.  8.  Whenever  the  physicians  of  either  of  the 
State  prisons  of  this  State  shall  certify  to  the  inspect 
ors,  that  any  convict  is  insane,  they  shall  make  imme 
diately  a  full  examination  into  the  condition  of  such 
convict,  and  shall  cause  such  convict  to  be  examined 
by  one  of  the  physicians  of  the  State  Lunatic  Asylum, 
at  Utica,  and  if  satisfied  that  said  convict  is  insane,  or 
that  there  is  probable  cause  to  believe  such  convict  to 
be  insane,  they  shall  order  the  agent  and  warden  of  the 
prison  where  such  convict  is  confined  forthwith  to  con 
vey  such  convict  to  the  State  Lunatic  Asylum  for 
insane  convicts,  and  to  deliver  the  said  convict  to  the 
superintendent  thereof,  who  is  hereby  required  to  re 
ceive  said  convict  into  the  said  asylum,  and  retain  him 
there  so  long  as  he  shall  continue  to  be  insane;  and 
no  convict  who  has  been  committed  to  said  asylum 
as  insane  shall  be  discharged  from  said  asylum  by 
reason  of  the  expiration  of  the  term  for  which  he  was 
sentenced,  unless  the  relatives  of  such  convict  shall 
produce  to  said  superintendent  satisfactory  evidence 
of  their  ability  to  maintain  such  convict,  and  shall 
execute  and  deliver  to  said  superintendent  an  agree 
ment  in  writing  that  such  convict  shall  not  be  a  charge 
upon  any  public  charity,  if  such  convict  shall  continue 
to  be  insane  at  the  expiration  of  the  time  for  which 
such  convict  was  sentenced. 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  341 

Act  May  2ist,  1873. 

No  person,  association,  or  corporation  shall  establish 
or  keep  any  asylum,  institution,  or  house  of  retreat  for 
the  care,  custody,  or  treatment  of  the  insane,  or  per 
sons  of  unsound  mind,  without  first  obtaining  a  license 
therefor  from  the  Board  of  State  Charities :  Provided, 
That  this  section  shall  not  apply  to  any  State  asylum 
or  institution  or  to  any  asylum  or  institution  estab 
lished  or  conducted  by  any  county,  or  by  any  city  or 
municipal  corporation. 

The  said  board  may  revoke  the  license  of  any 
asylum  or  institution,  issued  under  the  provision  of  this 
act,  for  reasons  deemed  satisfactory  to  said  board ;  but 
such  revocation  shall  be  in  writing  and  filed,  and  notice 
given  in  writing  to  the  person,  association,  or  corpora 
tion  to  whom  such  license  was  given. 

Act  June  jth,  1873. 

If  any  inmate  of  any  such  almshouse,  when  admitted, 
is  insane,  or  thereafter  becomes  insane  or  of  unsound 
mind,  and  the  accommodations  in  sai.d  almshouse  are 
not  adequate  and  proper,  in  the  opinion  of  the  said 
secretary  of  the  State  Board  of  Charities,  for  his  treat 
ment  and  care,  the  said  secretary  may  cause  his  re 
moval  to  the  appropriate  State  asylum  for  the  insane, 
and  he  shall  be  received  by  the  officer  in  charge  of 
such  asylum,  and  maintained  therein  until  duly  dis 
charged. 

Ohio. — If  any  person  in  prison  shall,  after  the  com 
mission  of  an  offense,  and  before  conviction,  become 


342  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

insane  an    examining    court  may 

be  called  in  the  manner  provided  in  the  act  entitled 
and  if  such  court  shall  find  that  such 
person  became  insane  after  the  commission  of  the 
crime  or  misdemeanor  of  which  he  stands  charged  or 
indicted,  and  is  still  insane,  the  court  shall  proceed  and 
the  prisoner  shall,  for  the  time  being,  and  until  restored 
to  reason,  be  dealt  with  in  like  manner  as  other  lunatics 
are  required  to  be  after  inquest  had :  Provided,  how 
ever,  That  if  said  lunatic  be  discharged,  the  bond  given 
for  his  support  and  safe-keeping  shall  also  be  condi 
tioned  that  said  lunatic  shall,  when  restored  to  reason, 
answer  to  said  crime  or  misdemeanor  and  abide  the 
order  of  the  court  in  the  premises ;  and  any  such 
lunatic  may,  when  restored  to  reason,  be  prosecuted 
for  any  offense  committed  by  him  previous  to  such 
insanity. 

If  any  person,  after  being  convicted  of  any  crime  or 
misdemeanor,  and  before  the  execution  in  whole  or 
in  part  of  the  sentence  of  the  court,  become  insane,  it 
shall  be  the  duty  of  the  governor  of  the  State  to  in 
quire  into  the  facts,  and  he  may  pardon  such  lunatic, 
and  commute  or  suspend,  for  the  time  being,  the 
execution  in  such  manner  and  for  such  a  period  as  he 
may  think  proper,  and  may  by  his  warrant  to  the 
sheriff  of  the  proper  county,  or  warden  of  the  Ohio 
Penitentiary,  order  such  lunatic  to  be  conveyed  to  the 
asylum  and  there  kept  until  restored  to  his  reason. 
If  the  sentence  of  any  such  lunatic  is  suspended 
by  the  governor,  the  sentence  of  the  court  shall  be  exe 
cuted  upon  him  after  such  period  of  suspension  hath 
expired,  unless  otherwise  directed  by  the  governor. 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  343 

Rhode  Island. — If  upon  examination  a  judge  is  satis 
fied  that  the  person  thus  imprisoned  is  insane  or 
idiotic,  he  shall  have  the  power  to  order  the  removal 
of  such  prisoner  from  the  State  prison  or  jail  aforesaid, 
to  be  detained  in  the  State  asylum  for  the  insane,  if  he 
can  be  there  received,  or  if  not  in  the  Butler  hospital. 

Such  order  of  removal  shall  be  for  and  during  the  term 
of  said  prisoner's  sentence,  and  be  directed  to  the  sheriff 
of  the  county  in  which  such  prisoner  stands  committed. 

Any  person  removed  as  aforesaid,  upon  restoration 
to  reason  may,  by  an  order  of  either  of  the  judges  of 
the  Supreme  Court,  in  his  discretion,  be  remanded  to 
the  place  of  his  original  confinement,  to  serve  out  the 
remainder  of  his  term  of  service. 

Massachusetts. — The  physician  of  the  State  prison, 
as  chairman,  with  the  superintendent  of  the  State 
Lunatic  Hospital,  shall  constitute  a  commission  for  the 
examination  of  convicts  in  said  prison  alleged  to  be 
insane.  Each  commissioner  shall  receive  for  his  ser 
vices  in  such  capacity  his  traveling  expenses  and  three 
dollars  a  day  for  each  day  he  is  so  employed. 

The  commission  shall  investigate  the  case,  and  if,  in 
the  opinion  of  the  majority  of  them,  the  convict  has 
become  insane  and  his  removal  would  be  expedient, 
they  shall  so  report,  with  their  reasons,  to  a  judge  of  the 
Superior  Court,  who  shall  forthwith  issue  his  warrant 
under  the  seal  of  that  court,  directed  to  the  warden, 
authorizing  him  to  remove  the  convict  to.  one  of  the 

o 

State  lunatic  hospitals,  there  to  be  kept  till,  in  the 
opinion  of  the  superintendent  and  trustees  thereof,  he 
may  be  recommitted  consistently  with  his  health. 


344  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

When  a  convict  in  the  prison  appears  to  be  insane, 
the  warden  or  inspector  shall  give  notice  to  the  chair 
man  of  said  commission,  who  shall  forthwith  notify  the 
members  thereof  to  meet  at  the  prison. 

New  Hampshire. — The  governor,  with  the  advice 
of  the  council,  may  remove  to  the  asylum,  to  be  there 
kept  at  the  expense  of  the  State,  any  person  confined 
in  the  State  prison  who  is  insane. 

South  Carolina. — Any  judge  of  the  circuit  court  is 
authorized  to  send  .to  the  lunatic  asylum  every  person 
charged  with  the  commission  of  any  criminal  offense, 
who  shall,  upon  the  trial  before  him  prove  to  be  non 
compos  mentis,  and  the  said  judge  is  authorized  to  make 
all  necessary  orders  to  carry  into  effect  this  power. 

Tennessee. — That  section  5488  of  the  code  of  Ten 
nessee  be  so  amended  as  to  read,  whenever  the  physi 
cian  reports  to  the  keeper  of  the  penitentiary  that  any 
convict  is  insane,  and  ought  on  that  account  to  be  re 
moved  to  the  lunatic  asylum,  the  keeper  shall  cause 
such  insane  convict  to  be  removed  accordingly,  there 
to  remain  until  discharged  by  the  physician  of  said 
lunatic  asylum. 

Texas  and  Iowa. — If  any  person  charged  with  or 
convicted  of  any  criminal  offense,  be  found  to  be 
insane  in  the  court  before  which  he  is  so  charged  or 
convicted,  said  court  shall  order  him  to  be  conveyed  to 
and  retained  in  the  State  Lunatic  Asylum,  and  he  shall 
be  received  and  retained,  until  removed  by  the  order 
of  the  court  by  which  he  was  committed  to  the  asylum. 


CARE    OF   THE  INSANE.  345 

If  any  person  after  being  convicted  of  any  crime  or 
misdemeanor,  and  before  the  execution  in  whole  or 
part  of  the  sentence  of  the  court,  becomes  insane,  it 
shall  be  the  duty  of  the  governor  of  the  State  to  in 
quire  into  the  facts,  and  he  may  pardon  such  lunatic 
or  commute  or  suspend  for  the  time  being  the  execu 
tion,  in  such  manner  and  for  such  a  period  as  he  may 
think  proper,  and  may  by  his  warrant  to  the  sheriff  of 
the  proper  county,  or  warden  of  the  Iowa  Penitentiary, 
order  such  lunatic  to  be  conveyed  to  the  hospital  and 
there  kept  until  restored  to  reason. 

As  before  said,  the  State  of  New  York  has  made 
provision  for  the  care  in  hospitals  of  all  her  insane 
poor.  For  this  she  is  to  be  commended ;  in  this  to  be 
imitated.  But  the  hospital  or  asylum  referred  to  in  the 
foregoing  statutes  as  that  to  which  "  insane  convicts  " 
and  others  are  to  be  sent,  is  a  lunatic  asylum  estab 
lished  by  a  statute  of  1858,  on  the  prison  grounds  at 
Auburn,  expressly  for  this  object.  In  this,  her  purpose 
is  most  laudable ;  but  the  propriety  of  her  course  is 
most  questionable,  as  will  more  fully  appear  in  the 
sequel. 

This  board  had  the  honor,  last  year,  of  causing  to 
be  prepared  and  laid  before  the  senate  the  draught  of 
a  bill  "  to  provide  for  the  care  and  keeping  of  the 
criminal  insane  of  this  Commonwealth — including 
those  who  may  be  acquitted  of  crime  on  the  ground  of 
insanity."  And  the  proposition  was,  in  general  terms, 
that  a  department,  a  wing,  or  a  distinct  building  sur 
rounded  by  a  wall,  of  the  hospital  now  under  construc 
tion  at  Danville,  should  be  so  planned,  arranged, 


346  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

completed,  and  organized  as  to  make  it  fit,  suitable, 
and  convenient  for  the  care,  keeping,  and  treatment  of 
the  classes  of  insane  persons  referred  to.  It  may  be 
proper  to  say  that  the  board  had  chiefly  in  view  the 
more  numerous  class, — those  who  were  in  prisons  with 
criminals,  without  ever  having  been  convicted  of  crime  ; 
and  that  they  made  their  recommendation,  so  far  as 
regards  the  less  numerous  class,  the  strictly  "  convict 
insane,"  on  the  assumption,  which  we  have  shown  may 
fairly  be  made,  that  the  vast  majority  of  such  convicts 
were  really  insane,  or,  at  least,  in  the  incipient  or 
latent  stages  of  insanity,  at  the  time  the  acts  charged 
against  them  as  crimes  were  committed.*  They 

*  Report  in  relation  to  the  insane  convicts  in  the  Eastern  Penitentiary  on  Feb 
ruary  24th,  1873,  by  Edward  Townsend,  warden.     Number  this  date,  12. 
W.  W. — Confirmed  lunatic  on  admission. 
M.  L. — Imbecile  in  mind  on  admission. 
T.  R. — Unsound  mind  on  admission. 
A.  N. — Unsound  mind  on  admission. 
I.  B.  H. — Imbecile  on  admission. 
G.  V. — Decidedly  imbecile  when  admitted. 
M.  V.  B.  S. — Very  weak-minded  on  admission,  since  insane. 
Dora  S. — Insane  on  admission  and  remains  so. 

Mary  S. — Insane  on  admission  and  had  been  an  inmate  of  an  insane  asylum. 
M.  McG. — Very  feeble-minded  on  admission. 
E.  L. — Weak-minded,  bordering  on  lunacy,  when  admitted. 
P.  L. — Insane  on  admission. 

Report  of  Edward  S.  Wright,  warden  of  Western  Penitentiary,  on  the 
same  subject,  made  at  the  same  time.  Number  of  insane  convicts  in  peniten 
tiary,  8. 

Prisoner  No.  3324,  mental  health  impaired  on  admission. 
«    3720, 
«    3750, 
"    3958, 

"  "    4006,  "  "  " 

"  "    4008,  " 

"  "    4019,  insane  on  admission. 

"  "    4030,  "  "  " 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  347 

were  cases  of  this  sort,  or  this  was  the  aspect  of 
the  cases  we  had  in  mind,  and  for  which  we  sought 
relief;  the  others,  the  ten  per  cent,  or  so,  we  regarded 
as  simply  exceptions,  which,  at  all  events,  should  not 
vitiate  the  rule.  We  proposed  but  did  not  urge  the 
bill ;  and,  through  misunderstanding,  and  in  conse 
quence  of  opposition  from  interested  parties,  it  was 
lost. 

At  the  late  meeting  in  Baltimore  of  the  Association 
of  Medical  Superintendents  of  Hospitals  for  the  Insane, 
it  was  openly  stated  by  a  member  from  Pennsylvania 
that  "  that  measure  was  defeated  (I  suppose)  by  the 
efforts  of  certain  members  of  this  association,"  and  the 
statement  was  not  contradicted.  (See  Journal  of  In 
sanity,  October,  1873,  page  236.) 

This  meeting  of  medical  superintendents  was  a  not 
able  one.  Believing  that  the  case  of  the  proposed  law 
just  referred  to  had  not  been  fully  understood,  and 
wishing  to  have  the  subject  freely  and  thoroughly 
ventilated,  we  addressed  to  the  president  of  this  asso 
ciation  the  following  communication  :— 

"  PHILADELPHIA,  May  28th,  1873. 

"  Dr.  J.  S.  Butler,  President  of  Convention  of  Medical 
Superintendents  for  the  Insane, 

"  DEAR  SIR  : — The  morning  papers  inform  me  that 
the  important  humanitarian  body  over  which  you  pre 
side  has  assembled,  for  the  consideration  of  the 
interests  of  the  insane,  in  convention  at  Baltimore. 
On  other  like  occasions,  the  commissioners  of  this 
board  have  been  honored  with  an  invitation, — to  be 
represented,  of  course,  in  presence  merely ;  but  still 


34$  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

we  are  glad  to  be  apprised  of  your  meeting  by  public 
announcement,  and  venture  to  address  you  on  a  sub 
ject  of  great  interest  to  this  board,  and  one  which,  we 
think,  has  escaped  any  authoritative  action  of  your 
body. 

"We  refer  to  the  subject  of  the  care  of  the  'crimi 
nal  insane.'  We  are  led  to  refer  this  matter  to  you 
for  action,  because  of  an  unsuccessful  effort  made  by 
this  board  to  have  a  precedent  established  by-the  Legis 
lature  of  the  State  of  Pennsylvania,  to  construct  a 
department  for  this  class  upon  the  grounds  of  the 
Hospital  for  the  Insane  at  Danville,  Pennsylvania,  for 
the  reception  and  treatment  of  (for  the  most  part)  the 
irresponsible  insane,  who  are  now  incarcerated  in  the 
penitentiaries  and  jails  of  this  Commonwealth. 

"  It  is  true  that  we  did  not  press  this  matter  upon 
the  legislature,  believing  that  the  simple  proposition 
should  be  sufficient  for  favorable  action  ;  but  as  the 
higher  advice  of  representatives  from  this  State  in 
your  convention  prevailed  to  defeat  the  measure  which 
we  proposed,  we  feel  justified  in  asking  you  to  take 
such  definite  action  as  will  have  like  influence  in  pro 
tecting  the  class  who  are  committed,  in  this  State,  at 
least  (I  am  glad  to  say  not  in  all  other  States),  to  the 
miseries  of  a  felon's  doom. 

"  In  noticing  this  subject  I  beg  your  permission  to 
venture  on  a  few  observations  on  this  subject,  and  in 
doing  so  I  express  the  mind  of  every  member  of  this 
board. 

"  It  is  a  fact  patent  to  all  of  us,  that  multitudes  of 
irresponsible  criminal  insane  are  now  in  prisons  of 
many  of  the  States,  and  it  is  equally  true  that  the  in- 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  349 

fluence  of  the  body  known  as  the  Association  of  Medi 
cal  Superintendents  of  American  Institutions  for  the 
Insane  has  exercised  a  most  potent  and  salutary  influ 
ence  "in  shaping  the  legislation  of  the  several  States  in 
behalf  of  this  afflicted  class  of  their  citizens. 

"  Believing  that  your  influence  will  avail  to  check  the 
enormous  wrong  which  the  class  we  refer  to  suffer,  we 
ask  your  intervention  in  their  behalf,  and  urge  you  to 
set  forth  a  distinct  and  definite  policy  which  shall  satisfy 
its  demands. 

"  We  know  that  in  Great  Britain  there  are  two  asy 
lums  for  the  specially  criminal  insane  ;  one  at  Broad- 
moor,  not  far  from  London,  a  distinct  institution,  with 
accommodations  for  from  five  to  six  hundred  inmates  ; 
and  one  at  Perth,  Scotland,  under  penal  jurisdiction, 
but  in  charge  of  a  special  superintendent. 

"  We  know  that  on  the  continent  of  Europe  there  is 
no  special  provision  for  the  criminal  insane  ;  it  being 
held  by  the  most  distinguished  alienist  physicians,  and 
so  proclaimed  in  many  works  on  psychological  subjects, 
that  insanity  should  level  all  distinctions ;  and,  as  Dr. 
Manning  reports,  that  *  the  great  gulf  which  separates 
the  convict  from  the  honest  man  is  bridged  over  by  in 
sanity  ;  that  when  sick  in  body,  the  prisoner  should  be 
kept  within  his  prison  and  treated  for  his  malady,  but 
when  sick  in  mind,  the  prison  should  be  opened  and  the 
badge  of  the  convict  be  forgotten.' 

"In  this  view,  the  well-known  humanitarian,  Miss 
Dix,  concurred. 

"  We  also  know  that  in  these  United  States  there  is 
an  asylum  for  insane  convicts  at  Auburn,  New  York, 
intended  originally  for  the  reception  of  such  as  became 


350  CARE    OF   THE  INSANE. 

insane  when  convicts,  but  more  recently  for  those,  also, 
who  have  been  acquitted  on  the  ground  of  insanity. 
We  know  of  no  other  special  provision  made  for  this 
class,  unless  it  be  in  jails.  In  the  State  of  Pennsylvania 
there  are  not,  we  think,  over  ten  per  cent,  of  the  num 
ber  who  are  now  confined  in  the  penitentiaries  and  jails 
who,  on  the  report  of  the  wardens  and  prison-keepers, 
were  not  insane  when  sentenced,  and  of  this  small  per 
centage  some,  of  course,  were  mentally  imbecile  or  in 
the  incipient  stage  of  insanity  when  the  crime  was 
committed.  The  law  holds  them  to  be  '  irresponsible/ 
and  still  they  are  held  as  felons  by  the  act  of  the  law. 
As  has  been  well  said,  'the  courts  fail  to  detect  the  disa 
bility  for  want  of  a  proper  defense  or  because  the 
mental  disease  is  still  latent.'  The  jails  thus  receive 
these  forlorn  'wards  of  the  State,'  forsaken  by  man  ; 
not,  we  believe,  by  God.  We  could  enumerate  instan 
ces  of  marked  cruelty  in  individual  cases,  but  we  point 
only  to  the  injustice  which  must  inevitably  oppress 
them,  when  subjected  to  the  treatment  of  prisoners  in 
the  State  and  county  jails.  Their  lightest  affliction 
being  perpetual  incarceration  without  the  slightest 
consideration  of  their  sufferings  or  their  needs.  This 
is  the  case  certainly  in  Pennsylvania. 

"  There  will  be  no  dispute  as  to  the  impolicy  as  well 
as  the  wrong-doing  of  such  '  proceedings/  These  '  irre 
sponsible  '  citizens  are,  as  if  often  said,  'wards  of  the 
State/  Surely  no  official  of  the  State,  no  private 
citizen,  who  is  the  head  of  a  family,  would  overlook  the 
claims  of  his  own  children.  They  would  extend  the 
solace  and  the  help  all  the  more  for  their  infirmities. 

"  In  the  year  1871  the  Massachusetts  Board  of  Public 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  351 

Chanties  addressed  communications  to  the  superin 
tendents  of  the  lunatic  hospitals  of  that  State,  requesting 
their  views  on  certain  points.  That  which  concerns 
this  board  is  the  inquiry  as  to  the  provision  which 
should  be  made  for  the  class  to  whom  we  refer.  It  is 
highly  honorable,  in  our  judgment,  to  the  intelligence 
as  well  as  to  the  humanity  of  each  of  these  distinguished 
gentlemen,  that  neither  recommended  that  a  hospital 
for  the  '  criminal  insane '  should  be  an  appendage  or 
an  appurtenance  of  a  prison,  or  built  at  all  on  prison 
grounds.  On  the  contrary,  although  one  of  them,  to 
relieve  the  urgency  of  the  case,  admits  that  he  has 
recommended  the  fitting  of  a  lunatic  ward  in  the  State 
prison,  to  be  placed  under  the  special  care  of  the  prison 
physician,  still  he  declares  '  there  would  be  but  little 
objection,  aside  from  sentiment,  to  the  treatment  of 
lunatic  convicts  in  a  properly  constructed  hospital  for 
the  insane,  where  they  would  not  mingle  indiscrimi 
nately  with  the  other  classes  of  patients.'  Another 
says,  '  I  would  not  advocate  making  it  an  adjunct  of  the 
State  prison,  or  any  penal  institution.'  The  last,  after 
recommending  that  a  distinct  institution  be  established 
for  the  reception  of  this  class,  says,  with  the  knowledge 
that  they  are  provided  for  [in  Massachusetts]  in  the 
State  lunatic  hospitals,  '  if  the  superintendents  and 
trustees  of  any  State  lunatic  hospital,  and  the  general 
agent  of  the  Board  of  State  Charities,  concur  in  the 
opinion  that  a  patient  of  said  hospital  ought  to  be 
removed  to  said  building,  he  should  be  so  removed. 
This  is  the  alternative  to  care  and  treatment  in  a  gene 
ral  hospital  for  the  insane  :  in  Pennsylvania  [it  would 
be]  from  a  prison  to  a  hospital. 


35 2  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

"As  the  result  of  the  investigations  of  this  intelligent 
commission,  and  the  views  forcibly  presented  by  the 
eminent  alienist  physicians  of  their  own  State,  viz., 
Drs.  Godding,  Earle,  and  Bemis,  this  cautious  board 
has  recommended  in  their  present  report,  just  issued, 
the  establishment  of  a  hospital  for  the  '  criminal  insane]  to 
be  placed  near  enough  one  of  the  other  State  hospitals  for 
the  insane  to  be  under  the  same  administration. 

"This  board  concurs  in  the  principle  which  underlies 
this  recommendation,  as  well  as  in  its  practical  wisdom, 
for  as  to  the  latter,  it  cannot  be  expected  that  any  one 
State  will  incur  the  expense  of  an  independent  estab 
lishment  for  this  class  and  the  cost  of  its  proper  over 
sight  and  maintenance.  As  has  been  already  stated, 
there  is  but  one  in  England  whose  population  approxi 
mates  to  our  own  (that  of  the  United  States).  As  to 
the  former,  there  is  no  moral  ground  upon  which  the 
separation  of  the  two  classes  can  be  based.  It  is 
simply  the  ground  of  disagreeableness,  to  those  who 
conduct  the  institution,  to  a  small  proportion  of  the 
patients,  and  to  some  of  their  friends.  It  is  '  sentiment/ 
and  this  we  admit  should  be  religiously  regarded  in  the 
consideration  of  every  provision  for  the  insane.  Let  it 
not  be  overlooked  in  behalf  of  the  class  we  are  now 
considering  !  We  say  sentiment  only,  for  the  scheme 
proposed  to  our  legislature  provided  for  a  separate 
and  secure  building,  separately  enclosed  with  suitable 
walls,  but  to  be  under  the  supervision  of  the  superintend 
ent  of  the  general  hospital,  on  the  same  premises. 

"  Believing  that  our  views  have  been  clearly  con 
veyed  in  this  communication,  and  excusing  its  crudeness 
by  the  obvious  necessity  of  haste,  I  beg  most  respect- 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  353 

fully  to  commit  the  subject  to  your  thoughtful  deter 
mination  and  action  ;  and  I  trust  that  they  may  be  so 
enlightened  as  to  reflect  honor  upon  your  body  and 
yourselves  individually — not  merely  for  the  present, 
but  for  all  time. 

"  I  am,  most  respectfully,  yours, 

"GEO.  L.  HARRISON, 

"  President" 

When  the  association  entered  upon  the  consideration 
of  this  letter,  the  following  resolutions  were  offered  : — 

"WHEREAS,  The  proper  disposal  of  that  class  of  the 
insane,  whose  criminal  acts  require  their  seclusion  and 
confinement,  is  a  matter  on  which  this  association  is 
requested  to  express  an  opinion. 

"i.  Resolved,  Therefore,  as  the  opinion  of  this  associ 
ation,  that  neither  jails  and  penitentiaries  nor  ordinary 
hospitals  for  the  insane  are  proper  receptacles  for  this 
class  of  persons ;  but  that  they  should  be  cared  for  in 
establishments  designed  expressly  and  solely  for  them. 

"2.  Resolved,  That  under  no  circumstances  should 
*  insane  convicts '  be  associated  with  other  insane  per 
sons,  believing  that  such  an  association  is  not  calcu 
lated  to  improve  the  condition  of  the  latter,  and  that 
the  best  interests  of  the  former  require  a  special 
management,  and  architectural  arrangements  of  a 
peculiar  kind,  both  very  different  from  such  as  are 
adapted  to  the  needs  of  other  classes  of  the  insane. 


354  CARE    OF   THE  INSANE. 

"  3.  Resolved,  also,  That  the  example  of  the  State 
of  New  York,  which  has  thus  provided  for  its  '  criminal 
insane/  as  they  are  usually  called,  be  commended  to 
imitation  by  other  States,  either  singly  or  collectively." 

We  take  the  liberty  of  reproducing  here  some  of  the 
most  noteworthy  utterances  which  this  discussion  called 
forth  in  the  association,  as  they  are  published  in  the 
Journal  of  Insanity,  before  cited. 

Dr.  Shew,  superintendent  of  the  general  hospital  for 
the  insane,  Middletown,  Connecticut : — "  If  the  resolu 
tions  refer  to  persons  who  commit  acts  which  would  be 
considered  criminal,  were  they  not  insane,  I  cannot  concur 
in  all  the  resolutions.  Many  of  the  patients  received  in 
our  hospital  commit  those  acts,  and  are  sent  to  the  hos 
pital  because  they  are  dangerous  to  society, — dangerous 
as  insane  persons.  It  seems  to  me  that  there  can  be  but 
one  opinion,  and  that  is  that  insane  criminals  should  be 
separated  entirely  from  patients  in  hospitals.  First, 
because  of  the  dangerous  influence  upon  other  patients; 
secondly,  because  of  the  odium  which  it  brings  on  the 
institution,  and  the  unpleasant  feeling  which  the  friends 
of  the  patients  have  in  supposing  or  believing  that 
their  loved  ones  are  associating  daily  and  hourly  with 
criminal  persons. 

"  In  practical  experience  I  have  not  found  that  *  in 
sane  convicts'  are  particularly  objectionable  in  them 
selves — not  so  much  as  Dr.  Shurtleff  and  Dr.  Curwen 
have."  [Dr.  Curwen  has  not  given  his  remarks  in  the 
official  publication.]  "Three  years  ago  the  Legislature 
of  Connecticut  passed  a  law  requiring  the  trustees  of 
the  hospital  at  Middletown  to  receive  all  insane  con- 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  355 

victs  after  a  proper  examination,  which  was  specified, 
and  a  commission  appointed.  We  had  no  separate 
provisions,  and  were  obliged  to  receive  them  in  the 
hospital  proper,  and  place  them  in  association  with  the 
other  patients.  Since  that  time  twelve  insane  convicts 
have  been  transferred  from  Wethersfield  to  Middle- 
town  ;  two  of  that  number  have  escaped  ;  one  of  them 
feigned  insanity ;  arrangements  had  been  made  to 
transfer  him  to  Wethersfield,  but  he  escaped  the  very 
night  before  the  transfer  was  to  be  made.  Of  the  ten 
others,  seven  have  been  among  the  most  valuable  farm 
laborers,  harmless,  industrious,  and  peaceable,  and  yet 
positively  insane ;  much  less  dangerous  than  many  of 
the  chronic  patients.  One  of  the  number  has  been 
very  valuable  the  past  few  years,  in  sharpening  the 
tools  used  by  the  stone-cutters  in  the  erection  of  the 
two  wings,  saving  the  cost  of  one  skilled  mechanic.  It 
was  his  trade  and  occupation  before  being  sent  to 
prison.  None  of  the  seven  who  have  been  employed 
ever  attempted  to  escape." 

[  Why,  then,  was  it  that  in  the  case  of  the  eight  in 
sane  convicts  sent  to  the  Harrisburg  institution,  Jive 
managed  to  escape  f] 

"  They  are  generally  liked  by  the  patients,  and  are 
not  more  troublesome  than  others.  The  friends  of  the 
patients  ['paying'  patients,  doubtless]  object  to  the 
association,  and  in  my  report  last  year  I  called  the 
attention  of  the  legislature  to  that  fact,  and  asked  that 
an  appropriation  be  made  for  a  separate  building,  dis 
tinct  from  the  main  hospital,  a  cottage  simply,  to 
provide  for  the  insane  convicts. 
During  the  present  year,  we  hope  to  have  a  building 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

for  the  accommodation  of  twenty  persons,  in  which  we 
will  provide  for  all  the  insane  convicts.  There  have 
been  only  three  transferred  from  Wethersfield  each 
year." 

Dr.  Shew  then — assuming  that  the  population  and 
resources  of  some  of  the  States,  and  the  number  of 
their  insane  convicts,  may  be  such  as  to  warrant  the 
construction  in  each  of  an  entirely  separate  hospital 
for  their  accommodation,  with  all  the  best  appoint 
ments  for  their  proper  care  and  treatment — proceeds  to 
express,  in  that  case,  his  preference  for  having  such  a 
hospital,  intended  exclusively  for  the  insane  convicts 
proper,  erected  on  the  grounds  of  the  State  prison, 
rather  than  on  those  of  a  general  hospital ;  but  other 
wise,  and  for  other  States,  he  clearly  prefers  such  an 
arrangement  as  he  has  described  at  Middletown. 

Dr.  Compton,  of  Mississippi : — 

"The  third  resolution,  I  think,  I  would  amend,  be 
cause  that  condemns  the  action  of  my  own  State  in 
this  matter.  It  declares  that  under.no  circumstances 
should  insane  convicts  be  permitted  to  associate  with 
other  insane  persons,  believing  that  such  association  is 
not  calculated  to  benefit  the  insane,  &c.  I  would  be 
very  decidedly  against  the  first  part  of  the  resolution, 
that,  'under  no  circumstances  should  they  be  associ 
ated.'  I  would  take  them  into  my  asylum  rather  than 
let  them  remain  in  the  penitentiary  or  jail.  In  the  ab 
sence  of  the  proper  provisions  I  would  take  them  out  of 
the  penitentiary  and  jails  and  put  them  into  my  asylum!' 

Dr.  Earle,  of  Northampton,  Massachusetts : — 

"  I  would  put  the  convict  insane  in  a  separate  insti 
tution,  independent  of  all  other  institutions.  I  would 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  357 

put  in  the  same  place  those  who  have  been  tried  for 
crime  and  acquitted  on  the  ground  of  insanity ;  then 
those  incendiary  and  homicidal  patients  who  never 
had  been  tried  for  crime.  I  would  make  the  provision 
that  they  should  be  removed  to  that  institution,  but  not 
unless  it  was  decided  by  the  superintendent  of  the 
hospital  and  the  Board  of  State  Chanties  and  its  agents; 
all  these  authorities  must  concur  before  a  man  who  had 
committed  a  criminal  act,  and  had  not  been  convicted 
of  crime,  should  be  removed  (not  from  the  common 
hospital  to  the  penitentiary  or  prison,  but)  from  the 
common  hospital  to  this  institution.  This  applies  only 
to  the  incendiary  and  homicidal  class,  because  our  most 
dangerous  patients  are  not  convicts,  and  have  never 
been  tried  for  crime  and  acquitted  on  the  ground  of 
insanity." 

Dr.  Grundy,  of  Athens,  Ohio : — 

"  In  endorsing  the  action  of  the  State  of  New  York, 
we  go  further  than  my  amendment  would  contemplate, 
because  we  endorse  this  course.  They  have  done  very 
well  in  providing  a  hospital  for  insane  convicts,  but  with 
those  insane  convicts  they  send  persons  who  are  com 
pelled  to  mingle  with  them,  whose  acts  of  violence  were 
committed  in  their  diseased  condition.  It  is  urged  that 
this  is  a  matter  of  expediency,  because  the  hospitals  are 
not  able  to  contain  them  for  various  reasons.  If  the 
hospitals  are  not  properly  constructed  make  them  so. 
If  special  arrangements  are  required  for  violent  pa 
tients,  have  those  special  arrangements  made."  The 
doctor  then  goes  on  to  speak  with  more  kindness  than 
respect  of  boards  of  State  charities;  but  with  this  we 
have  nothing  to  do. 


358  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

Dr.  Smith,  of  Fulton,  Missouri  :— 

"I  must  also  object  to  that  part  of  one  of  the  reso 
lutions  which  endorses  the  New  York  law.  Those 
conversant  with  this  law  inform  us  that  one  of  its  pro 
visions  requires  that  all  acquitted  on  the  ground  of  in 
sanity  shall,  in  the  discretion  of  the  judge,  be  sent  to 
the  same  institution  designed  for  convicts."  [And  he 
might  have  added,  standing  as  a  department  of  the 
State  prison.]  "  Such  a  provision  as  this  I  cannot  en 
dorse.  Endorsing  this  law  would 
be  equivalent  to  endorsing  the  punishment  of  the  insane, 
because  of  the  acquittal  of  crime  ;  the  penalty  of  assign 
ing  them  to  a  position  most  repulsive  to  their  feelings 
and  those  of  their  friends,  and  one  that  would  not  only 
retard  but  often  prevent  recovery."  [What  would  the 
doctor  have  said  of  sending  them,  as  zve  do,  not  to  a 
common  hospital,  but  to  a  common  prison  ?]  "  We 
have  patients  in  our  institution,  who,  prior  to  admission, 
committed  terrible  deeds,  and  no  doubt  there  are  such  in 
most  hospitals  for  the  insane.  We  have  fathers  who 
killed  their  wives  and  children,  and  a  mother  who 
killed  her  husband ;  all  under  the  influence  of  delu 
sions  in  regard  to  different  members  of  their  families. 
These  patients  have  been  as  orderly,  quiet,  and  pleas 
ant  as  any  in  our  building;  have  shown  no  tendency 
to  violence,  and  exerted  no  injurious  influence  over 
others." 

The  resolutions  were  amended  and  finally  passed  as 
follows,  and  were  transmitted  to  us  at  the  response  of 
the  association : — 

"WHEREAS,  The  President  of  the  Board  of  Charities 
of  Pennsylvania  has  requested  that  this  association 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  359 

should  express  its  opinion  in  regard  to  the  proper  dis 
position  of  insane  convicts  :  therefore, 

"Resolved,  That  neither  the  cells  of  penitentiaries 
and  jails,  nor  the  wards  of  ordinary  hospitals  for  the 
insane,  are  proper  places  for  the  custody  and  treatment 
of  this  class  of  the  insane. 

"  2.  That  when  the  number  of  this  class  in  any  State 
(or  in  any  two  or  more  adjoining  States  which  will  unite 
in  the  project)  is  sufficient  to  justify  such  a  course, 
these  cases  should  be  placed  in  a  hospital  specially 
provided  for  the  purpose  ;  and  that  until  this  can  be 
done,  they  should  be  treated  in  a  hospital  connected 
with  some  prison,  and  not  in  the  wards  nor  in  separate 
buildings  upon  any  part  of  the  grounds  of  an  ordinary 
hospital  for  the  insane." 

The  published  report  of  the  debate,  from  which  we 
have  made  the  foregoing  citations,  as  containing  import 
ant  medical  opinions  bearing  on  the  subject  in  hand, 
would  have  been  more  complete  and  fair,  as  well  as 
less  liable  to  misunderstanding,  if  the  letter  from  this 
board  which  called  it  forth  had  not  been  suppressed. 
It  would  then  have  appeared  that  both  the  debate  and 
the  final  action  of  the  association  failed  to  grasp  the 
precise  points  presented  in  the  letter.  They  treated 
the  subject  with  reference  to  an  ideal  standard,  rather 
than  with  reference  to  the  actual  laws  and  practice  of 
Pennsylvania  in  the  case. 

The  whole  debate  and  the  final  action  were  eventu 
ally  narrowed  down  to  the  case  of  "  insane  convicts  " 
exclusively,  instead  of  taking  into  view  all  the  classes 
of  the  "  criminal  insane,"  so  called,  which  were  pre 
sented  for  their  consideration. 


360  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

It  is  instructive,  however,  to  compare  the  resolutions 
finally  adopted  with  those  originally  proposed. 

1.  Both  sets  of  resolutions  agree — and  so  did,  ap 
parently,  every  member  of  the  association,  in  the  most 
emphatic  manner — in  the  fundamental  principle,  that 
neither  the   cells   of  jails   and   penitentiaries,  nor  the 
wards  of  ordinary  hospitals  for  the  insane,  are  proper 
receptacles  for  the  custody  and  treatment  of  that  class  of 
the  insane  whose  case  was  under  consideration. 

2.  The  resolutions  adopted  confine  themselves  to  the 
care  of  insane  convicts  as  such,  a  portion  only  of  the 
cases    submitted   for  consideration,  while  the  original 
preamble  included  the  "proper  disposal  of  that  class 
of  the  insane  whose  criminal  acts  require  their  seclu 
sion  and  confinement."     Precisely  what  class  was  in 
tended  to  be  thus  described   might  be  doubted,  but  if 
simply  "  insane  convicts  "  were  intended,  it  was  a  very 
circuitous  way  of  saying  so. 

3.  It    is    not  expressly  and   positively    declared,  in 
these  as  in  the  former  resolutions,  that,  under  no  cir 
cumstances,   should    "insane  convicts"   be  associated 
with  other  insane  persons  ;  but  merely  that  they  should 
be  treated  "  in  a  hospital  specially  provided  for  the  pur 
pose" 

It  is  left  an  open  question  whether  or  not  other  spe 
cial  classes  of  insane  persons  may  be  treated  in  the 
same  specially-provided  hospital,  i.  e.,  supposing  such 
hospital  not  to  be  on  prison  grounds,  and,  at  the  same 
time,  not  a  department  of  any  ordinary  hospital  for  the 
insane. 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  361 

4.  The    commendation    of  the   New   York   plan  of 
sending  other  insane   persons   besides  convicts  to    a 
hospital    connected  with   a    State    prison,  is  carefully 
avoided. 

5.  A  separate  hospital  for  this  class — separate  from 
prisons  as  well  as  ordinary  hospitals — is  proposed  as 
the  proper  and  desirable  plan,  provided  it  can  be  had. 

6.  Until  such  a  hospital  can  be  had,  it  is  proposed, 
as  an  imperfect,  temporary,  and  unsatisfactory  substi 
tute, — but  as  much  better  than  giving  "insane  convicts" 
no  special  or  remedial  treatment  at  all, — that  they,  i.  e., 
the  strictly  "  insane  convicts  "  as  such,  and  by  themselves, 
should  be  treated  in  a  hospital   connected  with   some 
prison,  rather  than  on  the  grounds  of  any  "  ordinary  " 
hospital  for  the  insane. 

The  conclusions  thus  reached,  as  far  as  they  go, 
would  be  quite  in  harmony  with  the  views  of  this 
board,  except,  perhaps,  in  the  last-mentioned  particu 
lar  ;  and,  on  that  point,  there  might  be  no  substantial 
disagreement  when  the  case  is  narrowed  down  to  the 
precise  circumstances  contemplated,  and  the  precise 
expressions  employed.  //  is,  in  terms,  an  undesirable 
alternative  which  is  thus  presented.  We  think,  and  we 
shall  hope  to  show,  that  it  is  neither  reasonable  nor 
necessary  to  resort  to  such  an  alternative  at  all. 

The  plan  of  two  or  more  States  joining  in  the  erec 
tion  or  support  of  a  hospital  for  insane  convicts  is 
not  new.  Such  a  plan  was  proposed  and  drawn  out 
at  large  by  Dr.  Edward  Jarvis,  of  Massachusetts,  in 


362  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

1857,  in  a  very  able  and  suggestive  paper  on  the 
"  criminal  insane."  We  cannot  but  regard  all  such 
propositions  as  simply  futile.  No  two  or  more  States 
will  ever  combine  in  building  a  common  hospital  for 
their  "  insane  convicts  ;  "  nor  will  any  one  State  ever 
provide  such  a  hospital  for  the  use  of  other  States. 
In  reference  to  such  joint  action,  the  case  of  insane 
convicts  is  very  different  from  that  of  the  blind  or  deaf- 
mutes  or  the  ordinary  insane.  We  may  therefore  dis 
miss  such  suggestions  as  visionary  and  illusory.  And 
the  fact  that  United  States  convicts  are  received  into 
the  convict-prisons  of  several  of  the  States,  in  the  ab 
sence  of  a  national  prison,  furnishes  no  parallel  at  all 
to  the  expedient  suggested,  of  one  State  taking  charge 
of  another  State's  convicts.  It  may  be  quite  possible, 
and  fair,  also,  for  a  child  to  accommodate  a  parent  in 
an  emergency,  and  impracticable  and  unreasonable  to 
extend  like  assistance  to  a  fellow-child.  But  let  it  be 
observed,  in  any  case,  that  we  make  no  objection  to  the 
joint  action  of  several  States  in  the  premises :  we  only 
express  a  decided  opinion  that  it  will  never  be  brought 
about. 

It  remains,  then,  for  each  State  to  make  provision 
for  herself.  We  must  consider  the  subject  in  this 
point  of  view,  if  we  are  to  give  it  any  practical  con 
sideration  at  all.  No  one  State — not  even  New  York 
or  Pennsylvania,  has  such  a  number  of  insane  convicts, 
in  the  strict  sense  of  the  term,  as  would  warrant  the 
erection  and  equipment  of  a  completely  separate  hos 
pital  for  their  exclusive  care  and  treatment, — such  a 
hospital  as  should  furnish  them  the  best  supervision 
and  attendance,  and  nothing  less  ought  to  be  furnished 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  363 

them.  The  number  of  such  convicts  in  this  State  is 
probably  not  many  more  at  any  one  time  than  could 
be  accommodated  in  Dr.  Shew's  " little  cottage"  at 
tached  to  his  hospital.  For  it  is  to  be  observed  that 
the  magnitude  of  the  existing  evil  in  this  particular 
case  consists  not  so  much  in  its  numerical  extent  as 
in  the  principle  involved,  and  in  its  ramifying  con 
nections. 

The  State  has  no  right  to  offset  economy  against  an 
injustice  or  against  inhumanity;  but  she  has  a  right,  in 
doing  justice,  to  study  economy  ;  and  she  is  likely  more 
fully  to  meet  the  demands  of  justice  and  humanity  on 
the  whole  and  in  the  long  run,  when  she  makes  her 
plans  with  a  far-seeing  and  systematic  economy,  than 
when  she  indulges  in  spasmodic  extravagance. 

It  may  be  assumed  as  another  settled  thing,  that  the 
State  will  never  establish  an  entirely  separate  hospital, 
separate  from  all  connection  either  with  prisons  or 
with  ordinary  hospitals,  for  the  exclusive  accommodation 
of  twenty  or  thirty  "insane  convicts"  and  provide  it 
with  all  the  appointments  of  a  complete  hospital  for 
the  care  and  treatment  of  the  insane.  This  plan  may 
be  dismissed  as  equally  visionary  and  illusory  with  the 
other. 

But  it  is  not  to  be  forgotten  that,  besides  the  strictly 
insane  convicts,  there  are  other  analogous  and  closely- 
bordering  classes  of  insane  persons  yet  to  be  provided 
for  in  this  State: — (i.)  Those  who  have  been  convicted 
of  crime,  but  have  served  out  their  sentences  and  con 
tinue  insane;  and  of  these,  there  may  be  nearly  as 
many  as  of  the  others.  (2.)  Those  who  have  been 
charged  with  crime,  but  found  insane  before  trial  or 


364  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

sentence  ;  these  are  a  class  as  numerous,  probably,  as 
the  insane  convicts,  and  yet  they  are  not  insane  con 
victs.  (3.)  Those  who  have  committed  terrible  acts  of 
violence  or  destruction,  as  homicide,  arson,  burglary, 
&c.,  and  have  been  acquitted  on  the  ground  of  in 
sanity,  but  who,  for  the  safety  of  the  community,  must 
be  kept  under  the  most  watchful  and  perhaps  rigorous 
restraint,  as  well  as  provided  with  the  most  skillful 
curative  treatment.  All  these  classes  are  now  in  our 
jails  and  penitentiaries  or  poor-houses,  or  are  by  law 
liable  to  be  there,  and  other  classes  besides  them;*  and 
their  case  is  be  provided  for  as  well  as  that  of  the 
strictly  insane  convicts.  And  even  if  a  special  hospital 
should  be  provided  for  insane  convicts,  in  connection 
with  some  prison  or  penitentiary,  and  on  the  prison 
ground,  rather  than  in  connection  with  one  of  the  State 
lunatic  asylums,  and  with  the  imperfect  appointments 
and  supervision  which  must  needs  characterize  such  an 

*  The  following  facts  are  reported  by  the  general  agent  of  this  board  under 
date  November  1st : — 

Insane  frequently  sent  to  prison,  sometimes  as  many  as  eight  or  ten  at  a  time, 
who  are  kept  until  the  court  decides  what  disposition  to  make  of  them. 

One  lunatic  sentenced  November  1 3th,  1868,  for  ten  days,  to  enter  bail  for  good 
behavior.  In  default  of  bail  he  has  been  confined  ever  since.  The  cause  of  his 
detention  is  the  want  of  suitable  accommodations  in  the  county  almshouse. 

Eight  insane  were  sent  to  this  prison  in  1872,  all  of  whom  were  transferred  to 
the  county  almshouse. 

One  lunatic  confined  since  last  winter,  was  sent  here  from  the  poor-house  for 
safety,  not  being  able  to  keep  her  at  the  latter. 

One  "  criminal  insane,"  confined  nearly  six  years  under  a  "  charge  "  of  arson. 

One  man  charged  with  having  stolen  a  horse  was  acquitted  on  the  ground  of 
ins.inity,  but  is  still  confined. 

One  committed  for  threat  to  kill. 

One  man  not  charged  with  crime  committed  for  safe-keeping. 

Insane  frequently  committed. 

One  charged  with  attempt  to  shoot  suffers  under  mental  disorder. 

Insane  frequently  committed. 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  365 

establishment,  considered  as  a  mere  department  of  the 
prison,  we  will  not  ask  now  whether  this  is  all  that  is 
due  to  the  "insane  convicts"  themselves ;  but  we  do  ask 
whether  those  other  classes  of  insane  persons  ought 
to  be  sent  to  such  a  hospital,  to  associate  with  the  in 
sane  convicts  in  a  department  of  a  prison  ?  Either 
that,  or  left  in  the  cells  of  the  jails  and  penitentiaries 
or  poor-houses,  where  they  are.  But  it  is  asked,  why 
not  send  them,  in  such  a  case,  to  the  ordinary  lunatic 
hospitals  ?  We  answer  by  asking  why  they  are  not 
uniformly  sent  there  now?  or  why,  when  sent  there, 
they  are  exposed  to  be  remanded  to  the  prison  cells  ? 

It  may  be  said  that  this  very  class  of  "  criminal  in 
sane"  are  in  the  hospitals,  and  that  the  "returns"  to 
this  board,  from  these  institutions,  present  this  fact 
continually.  We  have  not  denied  or  disputed  the  fact. 
We  have  not  found  fault  with  the  little  good  that  is 
done ;  but  only  with  the  great  wrong-doing  which  so 
completely  obscures  and  over-shadows  it.  The  law 
should  declare  the  rights  of  every  citizen,  and  vindicate 
them  uniformly  and  without  exception,  especially  the 
rights  of  the  poor  and  defenseless. 

In  fact,  the  whole  question  is  narrowed  down  to  these 
points : — 

1.  It  is  agreed  on  all  hands  that  neither  prisons  nor 
ordinary  hospitals,  with  the  ordinary  arrangements,  are 
fit  places   for  the   custody  and   treatment  of  "insane 
convicts." 

2.  The  co-operation  of  several  States  in  establishing 
or  maintaining  a  special  hospital  for  that  purpose  is 
out  of  the  question. 


366  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

3.  It  is  equally  out  of  the  question  for  one  State — 
for  this  State — to  provide  for  the  exclusive  use  of  this 
class  of  insane  an   entirely  separate  institution,  with 
the  proper  hospital  equipment  and  superintendence. 

4.  Their  special  hospital,  therefore,  if  they  are  to  have 
any,  must  either  be  upon  the  grounds  of  a  prison  and 
an  appendage  to  it,  with  the  imperfect  and  insufficient 
supervision  of  the  prison  physician,  the  attendance  of 
prison  overseers  or  keepers,  and  the  atmosphere  of 
prison  associations,  or  upon  the  grounds  of  some  State 
hospital,  so   as   to  be   under  the  same  supervision  of 
high   and    appropriate    medical    character,    the    same 
attendance  and  the  same  curative  influences ;  though, 
while  a  department  of  the  hospital,  it  may  be  made  as 
completely  secure,  and  kept  as   separate  from  it  as 
may  be   thought  best ; — to  be  denominated,  not  "  the 
convict   department,"    or  "  the    criminal   department," 
but    simply  "  the   special    department    of  such  a  hos 
pital."     This  remains  the  only  practical  alternative. 

If  the  former  course  is  chosen,  the  patients  will  not 
be  secured  that  degree  of  skillful  treatment  and  of 
humane  and  careful  attendance  which  is  their  due,  and 
without  which  there  is  small  prospect  of  their  recovery; 
and,  what  is  perhaps  more,  it  would  be  utterly  unjust 
and  outrageous  to  retain  those  other  classes  of  the 
insane, — if  placed  in  the  same  hospital  with  the  con 
victs, — not  only  in  connection  with  those  convicts,  but 
in  association  with  the  scenes  and  the  character  and 
the  odium  of  the  penitentiary.  Even  that  might,  in 
deed,  be  an  improvement  upon  their  present  condition; 
but  in  principle  and  in  fact,  the  wrong  inflicted  upon 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  367 

them  would  be  the  same ;  they  would  still  be  con 
signed  to  the  penitentiary.  Either  this,  we  say  again, 
or  they  must  be  sent  to  ordinary  hospitals. 

If,  on  the  other  hand,  the  latter  alternative  is  chosen, 
then  this  special  or  separate  department  of  the  hospital, 
instead  of  being  regarded  as  properly  intended  for  in 
sane  convicts,  may  and  should  be  regarded  as  intended 
chiefly,  and  in  the  first  instance,  for  the  accommodation 
and  safe-keeping  of  the  three  (and  perhaps  other]  classes 
of  insane  persons  above  described;  and  the  far  less 
numerous  class  of  insane  convicts  may  be  regarded  as 
being  admitted,  in  the  character  of  insane,  to  a  higher 
position  than,  as  convicts,  they  could  claim;  and  mean 
time,  the  infamy  of  incarcerating  innocent  and  helpless 
men  and  women  in  the  criminal's  dungeon  would  be 
done  away,  while  the  ordinary  hospitals  would  be 
relieved  from  the  charge  of  some  of  the  insane,  who 
require  the  most  special  and  expensive  arrangements 
for  their  safe-keeping.  //  would  not  be  that  the  insane 
'of  these  other  classes  would  be  thrust  into  a  convict  hos 
pital;  bitt  convicts  woitld  be  admitted  to  a  hospital 
intended  for  other  classes.  And  even  this  need  not  con 
tinue,  and  should  continue  no  longer  than  till  the  State 
should  feel  justified  in  establishing  a  totally  separate 
hospital  for  the  insane  convicts  themselves.  If,  till  then, 
it  be  thought  a  wrong  to  these  other  classes  of  luna 
tics,  that  convicts,  though  insane  like  themselves  and 
equally  irresponsible,  should  be  thrust  upon  their 
society  at  all,  we  answer  that  among  these  classes  as 
little  of  actual  association  or  intercourse  mio-ht  be 

o 

allowed,  even  within  this  separate  department  or  wing 
of  the  hospital,  which  they  would  occupy  in  common, 


368  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

as  might  be  thought  advisable.  At  all  events,  to  be 
obliged  to  be  associated  with  insane  convicts  in  a  com 
mon  hospital  is  small  ground  for  complaint,  in  com 
parison  with  being  thrust  into  association  with  felons, 
sane  as  well  as  insane,  in  a  common  prison.  As  to 
the  inmates  of  the  other  departments  of  the  general 
hospital,  on  whose  grounds  this  special  and  separate 
department  would  stand,  for  us  or  for  their  friends  to 
think  of  any  hardship  or  degradation  to  them  in  con 
sequence  of  their  separate  connection  with  this  depart 
ment,  is,  surely,  nothing  less  than  the  most  superlative 
extravagance  or  sentimental  fastidiousness  ;  especially 
when  it  is  remembered  that  the  whole  hospital  is 
furnished  by  the  liberality  of  the  State  for  the  accom 
modation  of  poor  and  destitute  insane  people  ;  people, 
too,  who  would,  otherwise,  be  miserably  and  hopelessly 
languishing  in  poor-houses  and  prisons. 

And  besides,  the  objection  to  making  the  provision 
we  have  suggested  for  the  criminal  insane,  so  called,  in 
a  separate  department  on  hospital  grounds,  leaves  only 
the  alternative  of  keeping  them  in  direct  association 
with  unoffending  insane  in  the  poor-houses,  where  they 
are  constantly  sent;  so  that,  as  these  are  not  " paying" 
patients,  it  would  seem  that  they  are  to  be  left  out  in  a 
discussion  of  the  subject,  and  their  rights  are  not  to  be  \ 
considered.  Let  us  not  continue,  as  a  State,  to  inflict, 
by  the  wholesale,  upon  our  helpless  fellow-creatures, 
the  most  outrageous  wrongs,  waiting  until  we  can  be 
sure  of  doing  right  with  the  most  mathematical  pre 
cision,  or  after  the  nicest  and  most  perfect  ideal  and 
sentimental  model.  Let  us  not  strain  out  the  gnat 
while  we  unhesitatingly  swallow  the  camel ! 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  369 

The  suggestion  that,  dealing  with  insane  convicts, 
one  or  two  things  must  occur,  namely,  that  "  you  must 
make  a  prison  of  the  hospital  or  a  hospital  of  the 
prison,"  and  that  the  latter  alternative  is  wiser  and 
more  humane,  is,  we  consider,  more  specious  than 
sound.  We  think  we  have  shown  that  the  tendency 
of  the  prevailing  system  in  this  State  is  to  "  imprison  " 
numbers  of  irresponsible  insane,  whose  clear  right  it  is 
to  enjoy  "  hospital "  care.  Surely  this  should  be  re 
versed  even  at  the  inconvenience  (if  it  need  be  and  if 
it  be  such)  to  the  hospital  of  caring  for  a  few  individuals 
who  have  been  guilty  of  crime  and  have  since  become 
insane. 

One  of  the  strangest  and  most  inhuman  suggestions 
in  regard  to  the  insanity  of  convicts  is,  that  it  should 
be  considered  as  "a  part  of  their  punishment."  So  far 
as  their  whole  punishment  is  to  be  regarded  as  a  divine 
infliction,  the  suggestion  is  entirely  true  and  God's 
ways  can  undoubtedly  be  vindicated ;  but  from  this 
point  of  view  the  same  is  true  of  all  cases  of  insanity ; 
they  are  all  visitations  of  Divine  Providence  and  as 
such  are  just  and  are  not  to  be  murmured  against. 
However  great  the  suffering  it  is  in  every  case  a 
righteous  infliction.  But  to  say  that  insanity  is  any 
part  of  the  punishment  inflicted  on  convicts  by  the 
sentence  of  human  law,  is  simply  false.  If  it  were 
true ;  if  by  the  sentence  of  the  law  men  were  to 
be  driven  insane  as  a  punishment  for  their  crimes- 
some,  and  not  others,  without  any  "rhyme  or  reason" 
in  making  the  distinction — it  would  be  nothing  short  of 
the  grossest  and  most  detestable  inhumanity  as  well  as 
injustice.  In  the  case  of  convicts  insanity  is  no  more 


37°  CARE    OF   THE  INSANE. 

a  part  of  their  punishment  than  any  other  disease.  If 
a  convict  is  seized  with  fever  or  small-pox,  shall  we  say 
"  it  is  a  part  of  his  punishment,"  and  so  leave  him  to 
its  consequences  ?  No  !  we  are  to  give  him  such  diet 
and  care  and  medical  treatment  as  will  be  likely  to 
insure  his  recovery  in  the  shortest  time.  This  can  be 
done  in  the  prison  hospital.  All  we  ask  is  that  the 
same  be  done  in  case  the  disease  is  insanity.  If  this 
can  be  done  ;  if  the  best  medical  superintendence  and 
care  can  be  provided  in  connection  with  the  prison,  let 
it  be  done ;  we  have  no  objection  to  make.  But  if 
not, — if  better  provision  can  be  supplied  for  these  pur 
poses  in  connection  with  some  established  hospital  and 
at  vastly  less  cost, — then  let  this  latter  course  be  pre 
ferred  and  adopted. 

The  whole  matter  is  narrowed  to  a  question  of 
expediency  and  expense.  If  the  State  is  prepared  to 
meet  the  expense  of  providing  the  appointments  of  a 
first-class  hospital,  expressly  and  exclusively  for  twenty 
or  thirty  "  insane  convicts,"  very  well,  let  them  be 
provided.  But,  if  not,  let  some  other  adequate  pro 
vision  be  made.  At  all  events,  let  not  helpless  lunatics 
be  left  incarcerated  in  the  cells  of  prisons  and  poor- 
houses. 

We  have  said  before,  and  we  now  say  again,  that 
neither  insanity,  nor  the  privation  of  proper  treatment 
in  case  of  insanity,  is  any  part  of  the  sentence  imposed 
upon  convicts  by  law ;  and  if  there  are  still  any  who 
maintain  that  insanity  is  to  be  regarded  as  "  a  part  of 
the  convict's  punishment,"  we  beg  only  to  add  that 
such  views  as  these  are  not  shared  by  the  distinguished 
medical  gentlemen  nor  by  the  eminent  philanthropic 


CARE    OF   THE  INSANE.  371 

citizens  who  have  intelligently,  and  with  full  knowledge 
of  the  import  of  what  they  have  done,  set  their  hands 
to  the  accompanying  memorials  to  the  legislature, 
praying  your  honorable  bodies  to  redress  the  wrongs, 
not  merely  or  chiefly  of  insane  convicts,  but  of  the 
several  classes  of  insane  poor,  upon  whose  defense  we 
have  entered,  against  not  only  the  injurious  insinua 
tions  of  interested  parties,  but  the  actual  personal 
injuries  and  sufferings  wh^ch  are  continuously  heaped 
upon  them  m  defiance  of  every  impulse  of  humanity 
as  well  as  every  sober  and  righteous  conviction  of 
reason  and  sound  judgment. 

To  the  Board  of  Public  Charities  of  the  State  of  Penn 
sylvania  : 

The  undersigned,  practicing  physicians  of  the  cities 
of  Pittsburg  and  Allegheny,  request  your  board  to 
take  action  looking  to  the  repeal  or  modification  of 
some  of  the  provisions  of  law  in  relation  to  the  treat 
ment  of  insane,  more  especially  of  those  who  have 
been  acquitted  on  the  ground  of  insanity  or  who  have 
become  insane  while  incarcerated  in  prison  or  peni 
tentiary. 

We  understand  that  the  laws  of  this  State  in  refer 
ence  to  these  unfortunates  are  such,  that  in  some  cases 
the  courts  are  expressly  forbidden  to  commit  them  to 
the  hospitals  unless  they  are  deemed  speedily  curable; 
and  that  in  cases  where  insane  criminals  or  persons 
acquitted  on.  the  ground  of  insanity  have  been  sent  by 
the  court  to  the  hospital,  the  board  of  managers 
and  superintendent  or  physician,  if  they  deem  them 


372 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 


incurable,  may  send  them  back  to  the  jail  or  peniten 
tiary  from  which  they  came. 

We  are  assured  that  such  treatment  of  the  insane, 
whether  criminals  or  not,  is  inhuman ;  and  knowing  as 
we  do  that  a  prison  or  penitentiary  is  not  and  cannot 
be  a  fitting  place  for  the  treatment  of  human  beings  so 
sadly  afflicted,  whether  incurable  or  not,  we  earnestly 
appeal  to  you,  and  through  you  to  the  legislature  of 
our  State,  to  have  such  a  change  made  in  the  laws  as 
will  effectually  prevent  the  exposure  of  the  insane  of 
any  class  to  incarceration  in  our  prisons,  jails,  or  peni 
tentiaries.  Yours,  &c., 


ANDREW  FLEMING,  M.  D., 
GEO.  D.  BRUCE,  M.  D., 
H.  T.  COFFEY,  M.  D., 
F.  LE  MOYNE,  M.  D., 
W.  J.  ESTEP,  M.  D., 
J.  N.  DICKSON,  M.  D., 
THOS.  W.  SHAW,  M.  D., 
JOHN  DICKSON,  M.  D., 
A.  W.  McCov,  M.  D., 
JOHN  S.  DICKSON,  M.  D., 
W.  SNIVELY,  M.  D., 

PITTSBURG,  December,  1873. 


A.  M.  POLLOCK,  M.  D., 
W.  C.  REITER,  M.  D., 
JULIAN  ROGERS,  M.  D., 
R.  B.  MOWRY,  M.  D., 
C.  B.  KING,  M.  D., 
J.  B.  MURDOCH,  M.  D., 
W.  R.  HAMILTON,  M.  D., 
JAS.  KING,  M.  D., 
JAS.  MCCANN,  M.  D., 
T.  C.  RHOADS,  M.  D., 
JAMES  MACFARLANE,  M.  D, 


PHILADELPHIA,  December,  1873. 
To  the  Legislature  of  Pennsylvania  : 

The  undersigned,  members  of  the  medical  profes 
sion,  being  aware  of  the  sad  condition  of  the  "  poor  " 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 


373 


and  the  "  criminal  insane,"  who  are  suffering  cruel  per 
sonal  wrongs  and  constant  deterioration  of  their  mental 
and  bodily  condition  in  the  jails  and  poor-houses  of  the 
State,  respectfully  appeal  to  your  honorable  bodies  to 
provide  such  legislation  as  will  effectually  secure  the 
admission  and  detention  of  these  classes  in  the  State 
hospitals  for  the  insane  so  long  as  their  malady  re 
quires  it. 

We  believe  that  both  humanity  and  public  duty  de 
mand  such  legislation  for  the  relief  of  wrongful  suffer 
ing  and  for  the  restoration  to  health  and  usefulness  of 
these  afflicted  and  injured  classes. 


S.  D.  GROSS,  M.  D., 
JOSEPH  PANCOAST,  M.  D., 
ALFRED  STILLE,  M.  D., 
FRANCIS  G.  SMITH,  M.  D., 
S.WEIR  MITCHELL,  M.  D., 
WILLIAM  PEPPER,  M.  D., 
D.  HAYES  AGNEW,  M.  D., 
J.  FORSYTH  MEIGS,  M.  D., 


EDW.  HARTSHORNE,  M.  D., 
CASPAR  MORRIS,  M.  D., 
J.  M.  DA  COSTA,  M.  D., 
HIRAM  CORSON,  M.  D., 
HORATIO  C.  WOOD,  M.  D., 
JOHN  H.  PACKARD,  M.  D., 
F.  F.  MAURY,  M.  D. 


To  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives  of  Pennsyl 
vania: 

We  gladly  unite  our  names  with  those  of  the  emi 
nent  jurists,  the  distinguished  physicians,  the  inspect 
ors  and  wardens  of  the  penitentiaries,  and  other  noted 
personages,  familiar  with  the  subject,  in  the  appeal  of 
the  Board  of  Public  Charities  to  your  honorable  bodies 
to  redress,  by  proper  legislation,  the  wrongs  of  the 


374  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

"poor"  and  the ''criminal"  insane,  who  are  now  con 
signed  to  the  jails  and  almshouses  of  the  State,  and 
who  should,  properly,  be  placed  in  the  State  hospitals 
for  the  insane,  which  were  established  by  the  public 
for  their  reception,  their  care,  and  remedial  treatment. 


JAMES  J.  BARCLAY, 
JOSEPH  R.  CHANDLER, 
MAHLON  H.  DICKINSON, 
HENRY  C.  CAREY, 
ISAAC  LEA, 
JOHN  O.  JAMES, 
JAMES  THOMPSON  (late 
Chief  Justice), 

DECEMBER  ist,  1873. 


WM.  BACON  STEVENS, 
JOHN  WELSH, 
CALEB  COPE, 
JOHN  M.  WHITALL, 
WILLIAM  BIGLER, 
ASA  WHITNEY, 
M.  SIMPSON,  Bishop. 


After  the  fullest  investigation  of  facts  and  the  ma- 
turest  reflection  upon  the  case,  we  are  constrained  to 
declare  that,  in  our  clear  conviction  and  judgment, 
every  consideration  of  humanity,  justice,  propriety,  and 
expediency  is  combined  in  favor  of  placing  the  special 
hospital  for  the  " criminal insane"  so  called,  including \ 
incidentally  and  temporarily,  "insane  convicts"  on  the 
grounds  of  some  State  hospital,  so  as  to  be  under  a 
common  superintendence  therewith,  rather  than  within 
the  purlieus  of  any  prison. 

We,  therefore,  most  earnestly  renew  our  recommen 
dation  that  such  a  separate  hospital  department  be 
speedily  provided,  with  the  proper  construction  and 
arrangements  for  the  purposes  indicated,  on  the 
grounds  of  the  Danville  hospital. 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  375 

We  further  feel  constrained  to  suggest — and  we  do 
it  with  much  hesitation  and  with  sincere  respect  for  all 
parties — that,  in  forming  a  judgment  of  this  scheme,  a 
preponderating  weight  ought  not  to  be  attached  to 
the  opinions  of  parties  who  may  have  any  personal 
interest  or  convenience  involved  in  the  question,  how 
ever  respectable  they  may  be,  and  even  though  they 
present  themselves  in  the  character  of  experts.  The 
authority  of  experts  is  limited  to  their  particular  pro 
fessional  sphere.  Their  proper  office  is  to  serve  as 
witnesses  and  not  as  judges ;  and  any  intelligent  and 
disinterested  layman,  who,  by  personal  observation 
and  thorough  study,  has  made  himself  acquainted  with 
the  condition  of  the  insane  in  our  penitentiaries,  jails, 
poor-houses,  and  hospitals,  is  as  well  (perhaps  better) 
qualified  to  judge  as  they  are  of  the  broad  features  of 
any  plan  proposed  for  ameliorating  that  condition; — to 
judge  what  is  consistent  with  or  demanded  by  the  dic 
tates  of  justice,  humanity,  and  the  public  good. 

We  beg  also  to  suggest  that,  for  examining  and  de 
termining  what  persons  should  be  transferred  from  the 
prisons  or  poor-houses  or  other  hospitals,  to  the  sepa 
rate  hospital  department  above  recommended,  or  there 
from  to  prison  or  the  other  hospitals,  the  law  should 
provide  that  either  the  Board  of  Public  Charities,  by 
their  general  agent  or  some  other  commissioner  or 
commissioners  specially  appointed,  — who  should  make 
themselves  thoroughly  acquainted  with  the  condition 
and  wants  of  the  insane  throughout  the  Common 
wealth  (i.  £.,  of  such  as  are  kept  under  detention  and 
restraint),  who  could  be  supposed  to  have  no  interest 
to  subserve  but  those  of  justice,  humanity,  and  the 


376  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

public  good,  and  who  could  act  systematically  and  on 
general  and  impartial  principles, — should  have  the 
ultimate  control,  with  such  advice  from  the  superin 
tendents  of  the  State  hospitals  and  other  experts  as 
they  may  require;  or  as  in  the  case  of  the  New  York 
law  in  this  behalf,  with  the  aid  and  advice  of  a  com 
missioner  of  lunacy,  specially  appointed  to  aid  the 
Board  of  Public  Charities  in  their  action. 

If  your  honorable  bodies  should  prefer  the  appoint 
ment  of  an  independent  commission,  this  board  will,  of 
course,  be  entirely  satisfied. 

In  all  this,  we  presume,  of  course,  that  the  courts 
would,  in  the  first  instance,  make  such  disposition  of 
the  insane,  who  come  under  their  judicial  cognizance, 
as  they  should  by  law  be  authorized  or  required  to  do. 
Provision  might  also  be  made  for  carrying  up  any 
decision  of  the  aforesaid  commission  or  of  the  general 
agent  of  this  board  which  may  be  alleged  to  be  erro 
neous  or  unjust,  to  some  court,  to  be  reviewed  and 
either  confirmed  or  reversed.  It  is  remarkable  that  in 
the  late  convention  of  superintendents  of  the  insane, 
to  which  reference  has  before  been  made,  one  of  its 
members,  having  alluded  to  the  provision  of  the  New 
York  law,  empowering  a  judge  to  dispose,  according 
to  his  discretion,  of  persons  acquitted  of  murder  and 
other  crimes  on  the  ground  of  insanity — sending  them 
either  to  a  convict  hospital  or  some  other,  exclaimed, 
"Too  great  a  sweep  of  power  for  one  man  !"  And 
almost  immediately  after  another  member  naively 
declared  that  "  persons  acquitted  of  a  criminal  act  on 
the  ground  of  insanity  should  be  placed  in  the  hospital 
for  the  insane,  and .  the  moment  the  superintendent 


CARE    OF   THE  INSANE.  377 

considers  him  a  fit  subject  for  the  asylum  for  convicts 
he  should  be  sent  there"  ! 

The  truth  is,  the  very  fact  of  the  malady  being 
obscure,  and  thus  causing  the  general  public  to  neglect 
its  victims,  excepting  through  mere  curiosity,  makes  it 
important  that  the  State,  representing  the  community, 
should  have  a  special  agency  whose  duty  it  shall  be  to 
scrutinize  the  condition  and  needs  of  this  class.  Such 
a  commission  can  understand  these,  as  well  as  the 
physicians  or  attendants,  and  have  no  considerations 
of  personal  convenience  to  warp  the  judgment.  The 
simple  point  of  diagnosis  of  the  particular  phase  of 
the  malady  is  all  in  which  it  would  necessarily  be 
deficient. 

It  is  the  universal  practice  of  governments  which 
appoint  commissions  to  constitute  them  of  laymen. 

We  have  said  that  the  wrongs  of  the  insane  in  prisons 
and  poor-houses  continue  as  they  were  when  Miss 
Dix's  "  Memorial "  caused  the  State  to  provide  a  hos 
pital  for  their  alleviation.  We  now  say  that,  although 
every  hospital  built  and  projected  has  been  recom 
mended  to  the  legislature  with  the  same  view,  and 
seemingly  with  the  same  design,  the  system  pursued 
has  never  extinguished  and  never  will  extinguish  or 
even  abate  the  evil.  There  are  twelve  hundred  of 
these  (outside  of  Philadelphia,  where  alone  there  are 
one  thousand  and  fifty  in  the  almshouse  asylum) 
suffering  incarceration  and  neglect.  The  unnecessary 
costliness  of  these  hospital  establishments  for  the  indi 
gent  insane,  and  the  liberal  admission  into  them  of 
"paying  patients"  forbid  the  realization  of  the  inten 
tions  and  the  desires  of  the  legislature  and  the  public. 


378  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

In  conclusion,  we  think  we  may  assume  the  following 
as  established  principles  or  settled  points  : — 

1.  The  State  is  bound  to  provide,  not  only  for  the 
safe-keeping,  but  for  the  proper  care  and  treatment  of 
all  her  insane  poor. 

2.  Neither  jails,  penitentiaries,  nor  poor-houses  are 
proper  places  for  their  detention  or  treatment,  what 
ever  may  be  the  character  of  their  insanity,  or  whether 
it  be  recent  or  of  long  standing — curable  or  incurable. 

3.  A  person  while  insane  can  be  guilty  of  no  crime, 
and  it  is  both  unjust  and  inhuman  to  consign  innocent 
men  and  women  to  the  ignominious  cells  of  jails   and 
penitentiaries,  or  to  the  foul  kennels  of  poor-houses, 
simply  because,  though  insane  and  irresponsible,  they 
are  "dangerous  to  be  at  large." 

4.  Even  insane  convicts  ought  not  to  be  retained  in 
the  cells  of  prisons,  but  transferred  to   some  hospital 
where  they  may  be  both  safely  kept  and  receive  appro 
priate  medical  treatment. 

In  view  of  the  foregoing  admitted  facts  and  princi 
ples,  this  board  begs  to  renew  and  repeat,  by  way  of 
summary,  the  following  recommendations,  and  most 
earnestly  to  urge  them  upon  the  attention  of  the 
legislature  : — 

i.  That  the  law  of  April  8th,  1861,  be  repealed,  or 
amended,  in  the  points  indicated  in  this  report. 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  379 

2.  That  the  State  should  make  prompt  and  adequate 
provision  in  general  State  hospitals  for  all  the  insane 
poor  in   the   Commonwealth,   determine   by  law    how 
their  expenses  should    be    paid,   require    the    several 
counties  either  to  make  equally  suitable  provisions  in 
proper  hospitals  for  their  insane  poor,  or  to  send  them 
to   the  State  hospitals,  and   require  the  authorities  of 
these  hospitals  to  receive  and  retain  them  as  long  as 
they  need  hospital  care. 

3.  That  a  separate  wing  or  department  of  one  of  the 
State  hospitals — to  be  under  the  charge  of  its  superin 
tendent — should  be  suitably  constructed,  arranged,  and 
equipped  for  the  reception,  custody,  and  proper  medical 
treatment  (i)  of  those  persons  who  continue  insane  after 
completing  the  period  of  their  sentence  for  crime  ;    (2) 
of  those  who,  being  charged  with  the   commission  of 
crime  while  sane,  are  adjudged  insane  before  trial  or 
sentence  ;  (3)   of  those  who  are  acquitted  of  certain 
crimes,  as  murder,  arson,  rape,  burglary,  &c.,  on  the 
ground  of  insanity,  and  are  adjudged   too   dangerous 
to  be  discharged,  and,  (4)  perhaps,  of  other  dangerous 
lunatics  ; — all  these  to  be  sent  either  to   this   depart 
ment  or  to  the  ordinary  hospitals,   according  to  the 
discretion  of  the  court  or  of  the  proper  commission. 

4.  That  all  other  insane  persons  who  are  brought 
up  for  the  sentence  of  the  courts   should  be  sent  to 
the   ordinary  hospitals,  so   that   no   insane  persons  in 
any  case  should  be  committed  to  prison. 

5.  That,  till  an  entirely  separate  hospital  may  be  pro 
vided  for  their  accommodation,  "insane  convicts  "  should 


380  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

be  admitted  to  appropriate  quarters  in  the  above-men 
tioned  special  department, — their  insanity  to  be  ascer 
tained  and  their  transfer  regulated  according  to  pro 
visions  of  law,  and  they  themselves  allowed  as  much 
or  as  little  association  with  the  inmates  of  this  depart 
ment  as  the  superintendent  of  the  hospital  shall  judge 
proper  and  expedient. 

6.  That   a    special    commission,   appointed    for    the 
purpose,  or  the  Board  of  Public  Charities  of  the  Com 
monwealth,  be  authorized  to  transfer  from  the   other 
State  hospitals  to  the  special  department  above  pro 
posed,  and  from  that  to  the  ordinary  hospitals,  such 
persons    as  upon  due  examination   and   inquiry  shall 
be  judged  proper.     Whether  this   same    commission 
should  have  authority  to  remove  insane  persons  from 
prison  to   the   special   hospital   department,   we  leave 
without  any  expression  of  opinion.     Definite  provisions 
as  to  this  might  be  prescribed  by  statute. 

7.  Inasmuch  as  there  are  strong  and  well-founded 
objections   to   condemning  any  person  as  incurably  in 
sane  beforehand,  and  as  the  presence  of  incurables  is  no 
more  disadvantageous   to   the  curable,  and  often  less 
so,  than  of  some  others  who  are  curable,  the  board 
are  not  prepared  to  recommend  their  systematic  sepa 
ration,  but,  under  the  presumption  that  general  hos 
pitals  will  be  provided  for  all  the  insane  poor,  leave 
them  to  be  retained  in  the  several  hospitals  and  dis 
tributed    in   each  as   the    superintendents    may   deem 
most  advisable. 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  381 

Such  are  our  recommendations,  and  we  present  and 
urge  them,  not  as  theories,  but  as  practical  sugges 
tions,  looking  to  positive  and  immediate  action. 

We  beg  to  call  the  particular  attention  of  the  mem 
bers  of  the  general  assembly  to  the  fact  that  most  of 
these  recommendations  are  supported  and  guaran 
teed,  not  by  the  MERE  OPINION,  BUT  BY  THE  DIRECT 

TESTIMONY     OF     THIS     BOARD     AND    ITS     GENERAL    AGENT  ; 

and  not  only  so,  but  by  both  the  opinions  and  the 
testimony  of  the  present  and  former  JUDGES  OF  OUR 

CRIMINAL  COURTS,  THE    JUDGES    OF    THE    SUPREME  COURT, 

and  by  the  INSPECTORS  AND  WARDENS  OF  OUR  PENITEN 
TIARIES,  as  well  as  by  those  of  many  superintendents  of 
the  insane,  whose  declarations  on  this  behalf  are 
embodied  in  this  report ;  as  also  by  those  of  LEARNED 
PHYSICIANS  and  INTELLIGENT  PHILANTHROPISTS,  who  have 
made  the  facts  of  this  case  a  subject  of  special  examina 
tion  and  study ;  to  which  many  other  names  might 
have  been  added  from  all  parts  of  the  State,  if  pains 
had  been  taken  to  secure  them ;  and,  finally,  by  the 

EXAMPLE  AND  EXPERIENCE  OF  OTHER  STATES. 


ADDENDUM   TO  PLEA. 

PAYING    PATIENTS    IN    STATE    LUNATIC    HOSPITALS    FOR  THE 

INSANE. 

THE  fact  that  so  great  a  number  of  the  poor  and 
"  criminal,"  though  irresponsible,  insane  of  this  Com 
monwealth  are  now  languishing  in  the  county  poor- 
houses  or  prisons,  notwithstanding  all  the  generous 


382  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

provision  made  for  them  in  the  State  hospitals,  is  be 
lieved  to  be  traceable,  in  a  large  degree,  to  another 
fact,  that  more  than  half  of  the  inmates  of  some  of 
these  hospitals  are  and  have  been  not  poor  \*\&  paying 
patients.  This  is  especially  the  case  with  the  hospital 
at  Harrisburg.  In  behalf  of  this  hospital,  it  has,  indeed, 
been  given  out  of  late  that,  had  not  the  superintendent 
sent  the  cases  to  Danville,  the  proportion  of  patients 
from  the  authorities  of  the  counties  would  have  been 
greater  than  those  from  friends.  In  answer,  it  is  stated 
in  the  report  of  the  Dixmont  Hospital  just  issued  (and 
this  is  a  private  institution,  aided  by  the  State),  that, 
since  the  opening  of  that  institution  in  1862,  one  thou 
sand  two  hundred  and  forty-nine  of  its  patients  have 
been  sent  by  friends,  and  one  thousand  two  hundred 
and  eighty-eight  by  authorities  in  charge  of  the  poor; 
while  at  Harrisburg  the  proportion  has  been  two  thou 
sand  two  hundred  and  sixteen  by  friends,  and  one 
thousand  two  hundred  and  seventy-eight  by  the  au 
thorities. 

This  state  of  things  is  made  a  subject  of  grave  com 
plaint  by  the  Board  of  Public  Charities.  But  a  serious 
attempt  seems  to  be  made  (in  some  quarters)  to  de 
fend  this  policy,  even  while  it  implies  and  necessitates 
the  exclusion  of  so  many  of  the  insane  poor. 

We  take  leave  to  introduce  here  the  statement  made 
on  this  subject  by  this  board  in  their  report  recently 
presented  to  the  legislature,  showing  that  they  had 
viewed  and  grasped  the  question  in  all  its  bearings: — 

"  It  may  be  said,  and  perhaps  with  truth,  that  in 
many  cases  the  friends  of  insane  patients  who  can 
furnish  the  smaller  sum  required  at  the  State  hospital 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  383 

for  their  support  would  not  be  able  to  meet  the 
heavier  charges  of  a  private  asylum  ;  and  that,  there 
fore,  such  insane  patients  must  be  thus  admitted  at  the 
hospital  or  sent  to  the  poor-house.  This  idea  seems 
highly  plausible,  and  might  at  first  receive  favor  from 
inconsiderate  persons.  But  upon  reflection  it  clearly 
appears  unsound  in  theory ;  and  upon  experience  it 
proves  highly  objectionable.  If  these  patients  are 
poor,  why  should  precisely  this  class  of  poor  patients 
have  precedence  of  those  who  are  still  poorer  ?  And 
if  they  are  rich — as  by  the  terms  of  the  statute  all 
"paying"  patients  are,  then  the  law  expressly  gives 
the  poor  the  precedence  over  them.  Besides,  all  these 
middle  measures  of  giving  public  aid  to  the  poor  are 
found  in  practice  to  be  dangerous,  and  liable  to  great 
abuses  on  the  part  both  of  the  recipients  and  the 
almoners  of  the  public  bounty.  This  case  has  proved 
itself,  in  our  judgment,  no  exception  to  the  general 
rule. 

"  It  may  be  suggested  that  it  has  been  thought  well  to 
have  some  paying  patients  in  order  to  give  respect 
ability  to  the  institution. 

"  We  can  scarcely  listen  to  the  suggestion  with 
patience,  or  answer  it  with  calmness.  If  all  the  poor 
were  already  provided  for  and  accommodated,  the  sug 
gestion  might  pass ;  although  we  should  not  make  it. 
We  should  never  propose  that  the  State  should  tax 
herself  to  furnish  hospital  accommodations  to  the  rich 
in  any  case,  whether  by  way  of  gratuity  or  of  profitable 
speculation.  But  this  is  not  the  case.  The  poor  are 
not  all  enjoying  the  care  and  treatment  of  the  hospitals; 
and  shall  they  by  the  hundred  and  the  thousand 


384  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

continue  to  languish  into  idiocy,  or  rave  out  their  mis 
erable  lives  in  the  cells  of  prisons,  with  malefactors  and 
felons,  or  in  the  more  wretched  and  hopeless  recep 
tacles  of  county  poor-houses,  in  order  that  the  hos 
pital,  which  receives  a  few  score  of  them,  may  be 
respectable,  and  its  superintendent  and  officers  may 
not  find  themselves  in  charge  of  an  institution  of  mere 
paupers  ?" 

The  attempt  is  now  made  to  defend  the  course  pur 
sued  at  the  State  hospitals,  by  exciting  a  special  public 
sympathy  in  favor  of  the  unfortunate  class  of  "  respect 
able  "  poor  persons,  who  may  have  become  insane,— 
persons  having  respectable  connections  and  respectable 
antecedents,  whose  friends  can  now  pay  a  moderate 
sum  for  their  treatment  in  the  hospital,  instead  of  their 
being  received — or  rather  rejected — as  paupers  ;  but 
who,  if  refused  on  those  terms,  could  not  have  their 
expenses  paid  at  a  private  institution,  and  would  simply 
go  to  increase  the  number  of  the  pauper  insane  who 
require  to  be  supported  and  cared  for  at  the  public 
expense. 

Now,  we  would  not  diminish  one  jot  the  public  in 
terest  for  this  worthy  class  of  unfortunate  persons. 
We  share  it  in  its  fullest  extent.  We  rejoice  that  for 
them  is  found  a  special  chord  of  sympathy  in  the  sus 
ceptibilities  of  the  public  mind,  and,  for  this  very 
reason,  we  think  they  should  not  be  received  as  pay 
ing  patients,  and  that  to  the  exclusion  of  the  poor,  in 
the  State  hospitals.  These  patients  have  friends  and 
some  means,  and  a  strong  hold  upon  personal  sym 
pathy  ;  if  they  need  aid,  it  is  most  properly  to  be 
afforded  them  through  private  and  not  through  public 


CARE    OF   THE  INSANE.  385 

channels  ;  and  we  believe  that  in  such  cases  it  would 
be  so  afforded,  and  that  they  would  generally  be  pro 
vided  for  at  private  institutions,  if  they  were  not  re 
ceived  at  the  State  hospitals.  But  who  is  to  provide 
for  those  who  have  no  friends  and  no  means  and  no 
claim  upon  any  man's  sympathy  except  their  helpless 
misery  and  the  shocking  repulsiveness  of  their  squalid 
and  abandoned  condition  ?  We  simply  maintain  that 
it  is  these  the  State  must  provide  for  first  of  all.  If, 
after  having  adequately  provided  for  them,  the  State 
has  still  the  means  and  the  disposition  to  make  public 
appropriations  for  eking  out  the  scanty  means  of  all 
her  less  fortunate  citizens,  who,  though  not  strictly 
poor,  are  in  comparatively  reduced  circumstances,  we 
might  or  we  might  not  object  to  her  so  doing;  but  for 
the  State  to  undertake  this  sort  of  communistic  charity 
now,  to  the  neglect  of  the  absolutely  helpless  poor,  is, 
we  maintain,  simply  preposterous.  Moreover,  we  do 
not  believe  that  the  superintendent  of  a  great  public 
charity  should  be  intrusted  with  this  sort  of  discretion 
in  selecting  its  recipients.  He  should  not  be  exposed 
to  the  danger  of  abusing  an  enormous  power  of  per 
sonal  patronage,  of  consulting  his  personal  convenience, 
or  being  influenced  by  the  special  solicitations  of  any 
body's  friends  in  dispensing  the  bounty  of  the  State. 

We  may  be  permitted  to  refer  to  some  cases  of  the 
misery  of  the  insane  poor  which  have  fallen  more  or 
less  directly  under  our  own  observation. 

i.  A  young  man  at county  poor-house,  whose 

father  had  treated  him  with  such  uniform  brutality,  and 
exacting  demands  upon  his  ability  to  labor,  as  literally 


386  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

to  drive  him  crazy.  The  slightest  sound  startled  him. 
He  was  afraid  of  the  approach  of  the  quietest  step, 
even  that  of  a  cat.  Night  and  day  he  was  thus  agi 
tated  by  terror ;  and  he  found  in  the  poor-house  no 
possible  care  or  treatment  which  could  alleviate  his 
misery  or  promise  the  least  hope  of  recovery. 

2.  In  the  same  place  there  was  another  young  man, 
whose  employer  had  abused  him  by  stoning  him  in  the 
field  when  his  work  was  not  satisfactory,  striking  head 
or  body,  as   the   case    might   be.     This  boy  never  re 
moved  his  hand  from  his  head  at  the  part  where  the 
stone  struck  him  last,  and  by  which  his  mental  health 
was  broken  down. 

3.  The  old  man  who  was  starved  to  death  in  a  poor- 
house  the  other  day,  medicine  being  forced  into  him, 
but  food  being  considered  unnecessary. 

4.  "The  attractive  young  lady"  driven  to  insanity 
by  her  seducer,  and  for  the  last  twenty  years  occupy 
ing  a  cell  of  filthiness,  with  wet  litter  for  a  bed,  resting 
like  a  beast  upon  her  haunches,  and  so  permanently 
cramped  as  to  be  capable  of  no  movement  but  such  as 
resembled  that  of  a  frog. 

5.  The   patient  in   another   poor-house,  who  exists 
perpetually  chained  by  the  wrists  to  the  ceiling,  lest  he 
may  tear  his  clothes. 

6.  The    young   girl    in    shackles    at  another   poor- 
house,   who,   at  the   name   of    "mother,"    utters   sobs 
whose  pathos  would  touch  the  most  callous  heart. 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  387 

7.  And  that  other  gentle-faced  child,  whose  malady 
has  been  caused  by  religious  over-excitement,  seeking 
in  vain  for  repose  amid  the  shrieks  of  the  intermingled 
inmates  of  the  insane  department  of  the  poor-house. 

8.  "The  splendid  old  man  "  in  chains  for  forty  years 

in  poor-house,   released  by  the    general    agent 

of  this  board,  himself  aiding  in  filing  off  his  chains. 

Add  to  the  foregoing  specimens  the  following,  which 
we  here  reproduce  from  the  report  of  the  board : — 

"  In  February  last  a  visit  was  paid  to  this  almshouse, 
and  an  insane  inmate  was  seen — a  young  woman  over 
twenty  years  of  age — whose  whole  dress  consisted  of 
a  thin  chemise  with  short  sleeves,  a  single  skirt,  and  a 
pair  of  shoes.  When  brought  before  the  visitors,  a 
borrowed  cloak  was  thrown  over  her  shoulders.  She 
was  blue  with  cold,  and  utterly  filthy  in  person.  Her 
cell  had  the  appearance  of  having  undergone  a  recent 
hasty  washing,  but  was  pervaded  with  an  odor  loath 
some  in  the  extreme.  On  the  day  of  this  visit,  the 
thermometer  fell  to  fourteen  degrees. 

"  In  March  another  visit  was  paid  to  the  institution 
by  several  gentlemen  in  a  body.  Only  one  portion  of 
the  building  was  visited,  which  is  supposed  to  be  de 
voted  exclusively  to  women.  In  one  cell  was  a  young 
woman,  the  one  already  referred  to.  Her  cell  was 
without  any  furniture  whatever ;  her  bed  consisted  of 
one  blanket ;  her  clothing  of  a  ragged  chemise,  open  to 
her  waist,  and  one  scanty  skirt  and  a  pair  of  shoes. 
She  was  indescribably  unclean,  and  alive  with  vermin. 
Her  cell  reeked  with  a  sickening  odor,  the  result  of  a 


388  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

total  absence  of  all  conveniences  of  cleanliness.  She 
shivered  with  cold  while  in  the  presence  of  her  visitors, 
the  thermometor  standing-  at  the  time  several  degrees 
below  the  freezing  point. 

"  Opposite  to  the  cell  which  we  have  very  faintly  de 
scribed  was  another.  The  short  day  had  already 
faded  into  dusk,  and,  as  the  light  was  thrown  through 
a  little  aperture  in  the  door,  it  fell  upon  two  wretched 
women,  both  of  whom  were  absolutely  without  a  single 
garment  to  cover  them.  One  of  the  poor  creatures  sat 
crouching  in  the  corner,  with  a  small  blanket  drawn 
across  her  shoulders,  while  the  other  was  crawling  on 
all-fours  on  the  floor,  without  even  this  poor  apology 
of  any  remnant  of  human  decency.  There  was  not  a 
particle  of  furniture  in  the  cell ;  and  there,  on  this 
wintry  March  night,  in  an  atmosphere  which  the  wit 
nesses  declare  to  have  been  utterly  horrible,  were 
these  two  human  beings,  brought  down  far  below  the 
level  of  our  domestic  brutes. 

"  In  an  adjoining  cell  the  visitors  found  a  man  lying 
on  an  old  mattress,  the  only  sign  of  furniture  which 
they  saw  in  either  of  the  rooms  inspected.  They  were 
informed  that  the  inmate  was  a  woman  ;  but,  upon  one 
of  the  gentlemen  calling  to  him,  he  sat  up,  and  it  was 
seen  that  it  was  a  man.  The  attendant,  with  some 
confusion,  explained  that  he  must  have  been  brought 
in  while  he  was  away. 

"  We  found  the  female  insane  department  in  a 
shocking  condition  ;  so  bad  that  it  would  be  impossible 
to  give  a  description  of  the  place  on  paper.  In  some 
cells  there  were  two  or  more  women  confined ;  some, 
without  any  clothing,  lying  on  the  floor  without  mat- 


OARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  389 

tress,  carpet,  or  anything  else,  except  an  old  Govern 
ment  blanket.     The  place  had  a  horrible,  putrid  odor. 

"  We  examined  one  woman  who  was  quite  young. 
I  was  afraid  to  go  near  her,  as  she  seemed  covered 
with  vermin.  We  were  all  much  shocked  by  the  visit, 
and  I  think  I  shall  remember  it  as  long  as  I  live." 

And  the  general  agent  reports  the  following  amongst 
many  like  instances  of  abuses  and  neglect  in  similar 
establishments : — 

"  Insane,  totally  neglected — morally,  physically,  and 
medically ;  less  attention  is  given  to  them  than  would 
be  given  to  the  lowest  animals  ;  four  are  incapable  of 
self-care,  confined  in  filthy  cells ;  one  a  female,  has 
great  neighborhood  notoriety,  from  sad  incidents  con 
nected  with  her  history.  Known  as  an  intelligent, 
esteemed,  and  attractive  young  lady,  the  daughter  of  a 
well-known  inhabitant  of  the  neighborhood,  she  fell  a 
victim  to  the  arts  of  the  seducer.  Insanity  is  alleged 
to  be  caused  by  her  disappointment.  This  occurred 
twenty-one  years  ago.  The  sad  case  is  rendered  still 
more  painful  by  her  present  forlorn  condition.  A  bed 
of  straw  upon  a  damp,  dirty  floor,  into  which  the  exter 
nal  light  can  find  no  entrance,  is  the  only  furniture. 
A  seat,  a  chair,  or  a  bench,  has  apparently  never  been 
furnished  ;  the  consequence  of  which  is  that  the  muscles 
of  the  lower  extremities,  from  the  cramped  position  in 
which  she  was  always  found,  have  become  permanently 
contracted,  so  that  the  only  movement  of  which  she  is 
capable  is  one  similar  to  that  of  a  frog." 

"An  unusually  large  number  of  insane,  many  of 
chronic  form,  but  quite  a  number  of  strongly  marked 
cases,  who  are  confined  and  had  been  chained  to  the 


39°  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

floor  until  released  by  my  direction.  A  young  girl  of 
seventeen  years  of  age  confined  in  a  gloomy  cell ;  since 
removed  by  my  request  to  the  State  hospital,  where 
she  is  gradually  being  restored." 

"  Twenty-two  insane  ;  twelve  are  kept  in  close  con 
finement,  some  in  chains ;  one  always  chained  to  the 
ceiling  to  prevent  him  from  tearing  his  clothes ;  some 
entirely  nude ;  at  least  six  with  straw  litters ;  not  one 
of  the  twelve  was  ever  removed  into  the  open  air.  All 
confined  in  apartments  opposite  each  other,  a  narrow 
corridor  extending  between  them.  The  effect  of  this 
close  proximity  was  to  make  the  day  and  night  hideous 
with  the  distressing  shrieks  and  yells  of  the  wretched 
and  maltreated  madmen." 

"  Eight  insane  ;  one  of  whom  hand-cuffed,  one  hop 
pled,  one  female  confined  to  her  room." 

"  One  hundred  and  thirty-five  inmates,  four  blind, 
one  palsied,  seven  idiots ;  seven  cells  in  the  basement, 
with  insane  in  each,  in  a  revolting  condition." 

"  Twenty  insane  ;  of  these  about  eight  were  confined, 
not  to  their  uncomfortable  cells  only,  but  restrained  by 
iron  fetters,  long  after  the  necessity  had  passed  away. 
These  were  removed  at  my  instigation,  and  the  doors 
of  their  cells  were  opened,  to  give  them  the  benefit  of 
the  open  air  and  exercise,  with  decided  improvement  in 
their  condition." 

Now,  all  these  cases,  and  others  without  number, 
have  had  their  histories  (histories  as  touching  to  human 
sensibilities  as  any  which  the  more  "  respectable  "  poor 
can  furnish),  which  should  excite  interest  and  sympathy, 
and  should  also  command  the  efforts  and  influence  of 
good  men  to  create  the  needed  revolution  in  the  system 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  391 

now  pursued  at  the  State  hospitals,  to  stop  it  at  once 
and  forever. 

It  is  a  fraud  on  the  public  to  allow  these  wards  of 
the  State — and  who  alone  of  this  class  are  strictly 
such — to  go  down  to  certain  misery  and  death,  while 
providing  from  the  public  resources  for  citizens  who 
can  be  helped  by  their  own  means  or  the  means  of 
friends. 

The  poor,  neglected  and  abused  orphans  and  seams 
tresses  and  widows'  sons  and  daughters,  whom  we 
meet  under  pauper  care  at  the  poor-houses,  would 
not  be  treated  even  there  as  they  are  treated,  if  they 
had  friends  who  would  look  after  them  and  protect 
them.  It  is  because  they  have  no  friends  to  help  them 
that  their  condition  is  so  forlorn. 

When  the  State  comes  to  take  care  of  them,  as  she, 
first  of  all,  should  do,  the  other  class — those  who  can 
pay  from  three  dollars  and  fifty  cents  to  five  dollars  or 
six  dollars  a  week — will  be  provided  for  as  they  are  else 
where,  and  as  others  who  are  slightly  above  them  in 
the  scale  of  affluence.  There  are  homes  and  hospitals 
for  all  of  this  latter  class,  for  widows  and  orphans,  for 
old  men  and  children,  whose  support  is,  in  part,  paid 
for  by  themselves  and  friends,  and  the  deficiency  made 
up  by  private  benevolence,  often  supplemented  from 
the  public  coffers. 

This  should  and  would  be  the  resource  of  the  "pay 
ing  patients"  now  in  the  State  hospitals,  if,  by  the 
personal  system  introduced  there,  the  State  had  not 
been  drawn  away  from  her  clear  duty  to  enlist  in  a 
scheme  of  charity  which  is  never  recognized  as  the 
proper  function  or  duty  of  the  State — certainly  not  as 


39 2  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

her  first  duty.  It  would  be  just  as  reasonable  to 
devote  the  almshouses  proper  to  the  maintenance  of 
paying  inmates  and  exclude  the  indigent,  leaving  them 
to  perish.  Just  recur  for  a  moment  to  the  cases  of 
wretchedness  described  above  and  imagine  one  of 
those  poor  creatures  (if  it  were  possible)  to  present 
himself  at  Harrisburg  and  implore  admission  to  the 
State  Lunatic  Hospital  and  to  receive  for  answer, 
"  How  much  can  your  friends  pay  ?  Can  you  pay 
three  dollars,  four  dollars,  or  five  dollars  per  week  for 
your  treatment  here  ?  If  not,  if  you  have  neither 
friends  nor  money,  we  have  no  room  for  you  ;  we  are 
already  crowded,  chiefly  by  those  who  can  pay ;  this 
hospital  was  not  established  especially  for  such  as  you  ; 
those  who  can  pay  must  have  precedence  over  those 
who  cannot ;  you  must  return  to  your  poor-house  or 
prison  and  die  there." 

What  cooler  mocking  of  humanity  can  be  conceived 
of  than  this  ?  Can  such  an  answer  be  a  true  interpre 
tation  of  the  mind  and  purpose  of  the  Commonwealth 
of  Pennsylvania  in  founding  her  hospitals  for  the 
insane  ?  Is  the  wretchedly  poor,  the  absolutely  naked 
and  destitute  lunatic,  whose  only  claim  is  his  misery, 
his  helplessness,  his  friendlessness,  to  be  met  with  the 
gentlemanly  and  supercilious  questions: — "What  is 
your  social  position  ?  Where  are  your  friends  ?  Where 
is  your  money?"  It  is  too  outrageous  to  think  of; 
there  are  no  words  whereby  the  enormity  can  be  prop 
erly  characterized. 

Was  ever  an  utterly  friendless,  helpless,  destitute, 
naked,  and  starving  pauper  turned  away  from  the 
doors  of  an  almshouse  in  any  Christian  or  civilized 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  393 

land,  to  wait  outside  till  all  (or  any)  of  the  more  respect 
able  poor,  who  could  pay  something  for  their  food 
and  clothing,  should  have  their  wants  supplied  ?  Was 
he  ever  told  by  the  superintendent  or  managers  of 
such  an  institution,  "  we  have  no  room  for  such  as  you 
just  now ;  you  are  too  poor  and  friendless  to  find  a 
lodging  here ;  the  sympathies  of  the  public  are,  in  the 
first  place,  for  the  more  respectable  class  of  indigent 
persons  ;  you  must  give  place  to  your  betters  ;  stay  out 
in  the  cold  and  die  as  quietly  as  you  can"?  Has  the 
State  ever  adopted,  or  is  she  ready  to  adopt,  such 
principles  as  those  in  the  administration  of  her  bounty? 
We  leave  these  questions  for  candid  and  thoughtful 
men  to  answer ;  protesting  again  that,  for  ourselves, 
we  are  not  wanting  in  sympathy  for  the  struggling  suf 
ferers  of  moderate  or  scanty  means ;  we  have  no 
quarrel  against  them,  or  against  any  who,  in  their 
Christian  benevolence,  may  be  making  personal  efforts 
or  sacrifices  to  afford  them  assistance  or  relief;  we 
simply  insist,  that  the  State  should,  FIRST  OF  ALL,  make 
provision  for  the  proper  care  of  the  absolutely  destitute 
and  friendless. 

In  our  judgment,  the  State  cannot,  at  least  now, 
afford  to  erect  and  maintain  hospitals  sufficient  for  the 
accommodation  of  both  of  these  classes,  viz.,  for  the 
poor  who  can  pay  nothing,  and  for  paying  patients  of 
scanty  means ;  and,  if  she  could,  she  should  begin  with 
the  former.  But  under  the  present  system  of  receiving 
into  her  hospitals  even  a  larger  number  of  the  latter 
class  than  of  the  former,  the  State,  with  all  her  benevo 
lent  efforts  and  magnificent  outlay  in  establishing  hos 
pitals  for  the  insane,  is  making  no  progress  zvhatever 


394  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

towards  relieving  all  of  the  former  class.  There  are 
now  twice  as  many  of  the  insane  poor  languishing  in 
the  dens  and  dungeons  of  the  poor-houses  and  prisons 
of  this  Commonwealth  as  there  were  when  Miss  Dix 
first  made  her  appeal  for  their  relief,  and  the  hospital 
at  Harrisburg  was  built  in  response  to  her  touching 
memorial. 

No  legerdemain  in  the  cautious  wording  or  adroit 
management  of  plausible  propositions  can  annihilate 
that  fact,  or  that  other  parallel  fact,  that,  in  the  mean 
time,  nearly  two-thirds  of  the  inmates  of  the  Harris- 
burg  hospital  have  been  "paying  patients."  It  matters 
not  what  excellent  resolutions,  purposes,  petitions,  or 
kind  intentions  are  arrayed  in  defense  against  us. 
We  make  no  personal  charges  of  corrupt  intentions,  but 
rather  of  mistaken  proceedings.  We  attack  a  system, 
not  men  nor  motives. 

If  it  be  alleged  that  the  presence  of  "  paying  patients" 
in  the  hospitals  is  not  the  cause  of  the  exclusion  or 
neglect  of  the  poor,  that  there  are  now  as  many  of  the 
insane  poor  in  the  State  hospitals  as  there  would  be  if 
there  were  no  "paying  patients"  in  them;  then  it  is 
evident,  if  that  be  true,  that  (the  present  system  in 
other  respects  being  retained)  we  need  erect  no  more 
hospitals  for  the  insane  poor ;  we  have  already  hospital 
accommodations  for  more  than  twice  as  many  of  them 
as  require  it.  Is  that  so  ? 

Should  it  be  said  that  when  application  is  made  for 
the  admission  of  the  pauper  insane  at  the  State  hos 
pitals,  no  recent  cases,  only  those  of  long  standing  or 
improbable  cure,  are  rejected?  The  answer  is,  that 
among  the  "paying  patients"  cases  of  long  standing 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  395 

and  little  likely  to  be  cured  are  actually  retained,  and 
even  admitted.  If,  by  the  contract  made  with  friends, 
such  cases  might  be  removed  from  the  hospital  at  the 
discretion  of  the  superintendent,  and  are  not,  we  do 
not  see  that  it  improves  the  case  in  any  point  of  vi,ew. 
We  have  no  doubt  that  these  "paying  patients"  may 
be  much  more  decent,  quiet,  gentlemanly,  and  agreeable 
inmates  of  the  establishment,  giving  the  superintendent 
much  less  distasteful  and  repulsive  work  and  trouble, 
than  those  who  might  be  brought  to  him  from  the  foul 
dens  of  poor-houses  or  cells  of  prisons.  All  this  we 
can  understand  ;  but  this  is  no  good  ground  in  law  or 
reason,  or  in  the  view  of  humanity,  for  preferring  the 
former  to  the  latter.  Should  it  be  alleged  that  neither 
the  county  authorities  nor  the  criminal  judges  are 
eVer  deterred  or  hindered  from  sending  insane  persons 
to  the  hospitals  by  being  told  that  it  is  already  full  or 
crowded ;  or  should  it  be  said  that,  though  these 
officials  are  invited  or  encouraged  by  the  hospital 
authorities  to  send  the  insane  thither,  they  yet  ob 
stinately  refuse  or  neglect  to  do  so  ;  then  all  we  have 
to  say  is,  the  laws  ought  at  once  to  be  so  amended  as 
to  compel  those  officials  to  send  the  lunatics  who  are  at 
their  disposal  to  the  hospital  at  all  events ;  and  if  then 
the  poor  do  not  come  in,  in  such  numbers  as  to  dis 
place  the  "  paying  patients,"  very  well,  we  have  no 
objection  to  make;  but  if  they  do,  then  we  say  the 
"  paying  patients  "  should  give  way  to  this  other  class. 
We  object  to  the  present  system.  We  demand  a 
revolution.  The  scheme  we  would  propose  to  substi 
tute  is  easily  understood.  It  is  simply  this  : — (i)  That, 
in  all  cases,  the  poor  and  friendless,  those  who  cannot 


39 6  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

pay,  should,  in  these  State  institutions,  have  precedence 
of  the  rich,  of  those  who  can  pay ;  and  (2)  that,  among 
the  poor,  recent  cases  should  have  the  precedence  of 
those  of  long  standing,  and  so  on,  until  as  soon  as 
possible  all  that  need  are  provided  for.  For  ourselves, 
we  believe  that  such  is  the  real  intent  of  the  laws  as 
they  now  stand ;  but  if  that  is  not  the  case,  and  if  the 
policy  hitherto  pursued  by  the  State  hospitals,  and  par 
ticularly  by  that  at  Harrisburg,  has  been,  as  is  alleged 
by  interested  parties,  in  accordance  with  the  existing 
laws  of  the  State, — which  we,  however,  on  our  part, 
emphatically  deny, — then  we  ask  that  the  laws  be 
forthwith  so  amended  as  to  secure  the  abandonment  of 
that  policy,  and  the  inauguration  of  another,  more  just 
and  more  in  conformity  with  the  plain  duty  and  proper 
functions  of  the  State. 


PROVISION  FOR  THE  INSANE  POOR. 

In  again  presenting  the  claims  of  the  insane  poor  to 
your  honorable  bodies,  we  are  quite  aware  that  the 
subject  has  already  been  made  familiar  by  our  frequent 
handling,  and  that  we  may  labor  under  some  disadvan 
tage  by  urging  the  matter  anew  upon  your  attention. 
We  believe,  however,  that,  considering  the  subject  as 
legislators,  and  aiming,  as  you  will  do,  jointly  to  protect 
the  interests  of  the  State  and  of  these,  her  recognized 
wards,  the  apprehension  of  importunity  will  not  apply 
to  yourselves,  as  may  possibly  be  the  case  with  such 
portion  of  the  public  as,  from  ignorance  or  indifference, 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  397 

are  conscious  of  no  responsibility  in  the  matter.  The 
majority  of  men,  however  humane  their  natures,  prefer 
to  give  money  as  alms  rather  than  care  or  considera 
tion.  They  put  their  hands  into  their  pockets  for  their 
share  of  the  poor  tax,  and  hold  their  account  with  the 
pauper  portion  of  the  community  to  be  thereafter 
closed.  They  do  not  want  to  hear  that  their  money 
has  been  misapplied,  or  to  have  their  consciences  or 
sympathies  disturbed  by  any  knowledge  of  the  suffer 
ings  of  the  wretched  creatures  whom  it  should  have 
relieved.  It  is  only  this  strange  but  common  union  of 
benevolence  and  indifference  in  human  proceedings 
which  can  explain  the  extraordinary  spectacle  that  has 
for  years  been  presented  in  this  State,  of  magnificent 
hospitals  on  the  one  side,  built  and  sustained  at  enor 
mous  cost  by  the  tax-payers,  for  the  benefit  of  the 
indigent  insane,  and,  on  the  other,  of  the  large  majority 
of  these  very  indigent  insane,  still  held  in  almshouses, 
debarred  from  any  reasonable  chance  of  cure,  and, 
in  many  cases,  receiving  treatment  which  would  be  an 
admitted  cruelty  if  visited  upon  brutes ;  chained  and 
naked,  lodged  in  pens  and  cages  unfit  for  the  habita 
tion  of  cattle ;  scantily  and  carelessly  fed ;  without 
bedding  or  blanket  or  fire  during  the  inclemency  of 
winter ;  and  all  this  in  wealthy  districts,  filled  with 
happy  homes  of  cultured  and  Christian  people. 

We  do  not  propose  to  detail  again  the  sickening 
minuticz  of  our  investigations.  Some  of  these,  we  thank 
fully  announce  to  you,  are  buried  in  the  dead  past, 
never  to  be  exhumed,  as  we  believe,  for  a  spectacle  of 
sorrow  and  discredit  to  the  communities  which  suffered 
them  to  exist.  But  we  must  submit,  as  briefly  as  we 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

can,  certain  facts  and  deductions  which,  we  trust,  will 
have  the  force  to  settle  your  convictions  as  to  the 
folly  as  well  as  cruelty  of  the  past  systems  in  this 
relation,  if  systems  they  may  be  called,  and  to  settle 
and  establish  other  and  better  ones,  which  will  main 
tain  the  dignity  and  benevolence  of  our  honorable 
State,  as  well  as  protect  her  financial  interests  from 
injudicious  and  unwise  expenditures. 

The  number  of  indigent  insane  in  the  State  hospi 
tals,  established  primarily  for  the  maintenance,  cure, 
and  treatment  of  this  class,  was  seven  hundred  and 
sixty-four  on  September  3Oth,  1874,  as  reported  by 
the  authorities  of  these  institutions;  while  the  number 
of  the  same  class  in  the  poor-houses  of  the  State  and 
under  other  county  provision,  amounted  to  one  thou 
sand  three  hundred  and  fifty-two  at  the  same  date, 
exclusive  of  the  insane  department  of  the  Philadelphia 
almshouse,  which  contained  one  thousand  and  seventy- 
five. 

It  is  towards  these  latter — this  great  body  of  help 
less  beings — that  we  would  direct  your  attention.  We 
urge  you  to  regard  them  critically  in  their  actual  con 
dition,  without  any  exaggerated  sentiment  or  aid  of  the 
imagination.  In  every  one  of  our  county  almshouses 
we  find  numbers  of  these  unfortunates  called  "  in 
curables,"  held  and  considered  as  a  dead-weight  upon 
society,  in  no  wise  differing  from  the  lower  animals  in 
intellect  or  efficiency,  to  be  lodged  and  fed  as  we  lodge 
and  feed  the  brute  creation,  with  such  scant  measure 
of  kindness  and  care  as  the  temper  of  the  superintend 
ent  may  dictate.  In  most  cases  these  officials  are 
chosen  either  from  political  motives  or  because  of 


CARE    OF   THE  INSANE.  399 

their  skill  and  experience  in  farming  operations ;  and 
such  considerations,  we  must  admit,  are  not  likely  to 
insure  a  proper  choice  for  the  responsible  position  of 
caring  for  "minds  diseased;"  even  if  an  almshouse  was 
a  place  where  such  scientific  ministering  were  practi 
cable.  The  superintendent  is  expected  to  make  the 
institution,  as  nearly  as  possible,  self-supporting.  The 
burden  of  his  ability  and  his  care-taking  must  be 
devoted  to  this  preponderating  effort.  The  insane 
inmate  can  give  but  little  aid  in  this  paramount  un 
dertaking,  and  he  is  therefore  a  clog  and  a  hindrance, 
and  pays  the  penalty  of  his  helplessness  in  partial  or 
absolute  neglect.  No  consideration  is  given  to  the 
phase  of  his  malady;  no  effort  is  made  to  discover 
whether  it  is  curable  or  incurable ;  and  it  is  the  grand 
exception  when  the  insane  inmate  of  a  poor-house 
issues  therefrom  clothed  in  his  right  mind. 

The  more  accurate  and  detailed  have  been  our  in 
vestigations  into  the  condition  of  this  class,  the  more 
are  we  convinced  that  none  of  God's  creatures  call 
upon  us  more  urgently  for  help  and  pity  than  the  in 
sane  man,  whom  we  have  thrust  ought  of  sight  into 
our  county  poor-houses  and  left  there  unnoticed  for 
years.  There  is  laid  upon  him  every  one  of  those 
forms  of  suffering  which  Christianity  calls  upon  us  to 
seek  out  and  relieve;  he  is  a  stranger  among  stran 
gers  ;  a  terrible  background  of  poverty  and  wretch 
edness  lies  behind  his  advent  into  the  place;  for, 
as  we  all  know,  so  general  is  the  perhaps  irrational 
but  natural  prejudice  against  these  institutions,  that 
nothing  but  utter  friendlessness  or  the  extremity  of 
want  can  account  for  his  entrance  into  it.  He  is  in 


400  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

prison  and  sick;  sick  with  a  deeper  disease  than  those 
which  only  kill  the  body;  the  man  himself  has  lost  the 
place,  rights,  and  well-nigh  the  existence  of  a  man; 
his  body  goes  to  and  fro,  performing  its  natural  func 
tions  as  an  animal,  but  the  living  creature  within,  which 
made  him  human  for  good  or  evil  ends,  which  gave  him 
the  chance  to  be  the  faithful  husband  and  father,  the 
useful  citizen,  the  God-fearing,  honest  helper  of  his 
fellow-men,  is  struck  with  death,  answers  not  to  any 
call  or  summons.  Surely  this  poor  wretch,  beyond 
any  other  man,  might  echo  the  cry  of  Job,  "Have 
pity  upon  me,  for  the  hand  of  God  hath  touched  me." 

To  act  humanely,  or  even  intelligently,  toward  any 
class,  it  is  necessary  that  we  should,  in  some  degree, 
comprehend  its  peculiar  character  and  needs,  and  its 
individual  idiosyncrasies.  This  is  not  difficult  to  do  in 
the  present  case. 

In  the  records  kept  by  the  State  and  other  insane 
hospitals,  one  or  two  curious  facts  have  been  elicited, 
bearing  strongly,  by  inference,  on  the  condition  of  the 
same  class  in  almshouses. 

First. — Subtracting  the  number  whose  profession  or 
business  is  unknown,  more  than  one-fourth  of  the 
whole  remainder  of  male  insane  patients  are  farmers 
or  farm  laborers,  and  a  large  proportion  of  the  female 
insane  patients  are  the  wives  and  daughters  of  the 
same  class.  The  fact  that  the  population  of  the  State 
is  largely  agricultural  does  not  altogether  explain  this 
result,  almost  the  same  disproportion  being  found  in 
the  statistics  of  the  insane  in  other  States  and  countries. 

The    solitude,    the    lack    of  intercourse   with   other 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  401 

minds,  the  increasingly  restricted  routine  of  ideas  year 
after  year,  all  undoubtedly  tend  to  make  the  agricul 
tural  life  one  tending  to  foster  any  disposition  to 
melancholy  mania.  Other  causes  will  readily  suggest 
themselves  to  any  one  familiar  with  the  habits  and 
modes  of  thought  of  the  population  of  our  agricul 
tural  districts.  The  small  farmer  or  farm  laborer  and 
his  wife  lead  lives  of  hard  manual  toil;  however  pure 
or  wholesome  the  mental  atmosphere  about  them  may 
be,  it  is  one  of  exceptional  narrowness  and  seclusion, 
where  the  same  small  subjects  of  thought  are  iterated 
and  reiterated  with  a  steady  monotony. 

More  than  the  dwellers  in  cities,  they  build  on  the 
good  opinion  of  their  neighbors  the  social  rank  they  are 
able  to  hold  in  the  small  community,  the  members  of 
which,  shut  out  from  the  outside  world,  watch  each  other 
from  generation  to  generation  with  exaggerated  inter 
est.  Petty  debts  and  petty  savings  assume  an  incredible 
magnitude  in  their  morbid  anxiety.  Many  a  man  and 
woman  give  their  whole  lives  to  hard  drudging  and  to 
small,  biting  economies  in  order  to  send  a  boy  to  col 
lege,  or  to  free  their  few  acres  from  mortgage.  In 
such  a  solitary,  narrow  life,  a  disappointment  or  grief 
or  physical  ailment  which  touches  the  brain  has  leisure 
to  canker  and  do  its  deadly  work,  which,  in  a  life  of 
less  circumscribed  ambitions  or  scope  of  outlook, 
would  healthfully  disappear  by  sheer  force  of  friction. 

The  deadly  work  at  last  is  done ;  the  man  is  pro 
nounced  insane ;  he  is  a  helpless  burden  on  the  State  ; 
his  family  sink  into  misery  and  poverty.  Now,  what 
would  humanity  and  common  sense  dictate  to  the  State 
as  the  proper  course  to  pursue  ?  Doubtless,  to  cure 


402  CARE    OF   THE  INSANE. 

the  man,  if  possible  ;  restore  him  to  his  place  as  a  work 
ing  citizen  and  the  supporter  of  his  family,  and  relieve 
herself  of  the  actual  burden  which  he  has  become,  and 
of  the  impending  burden  of  his  family.  The  State 
hospitals  ought  to  afford  skilled  medical  treatment  for 
his  case,  and  that  wholesome  change  of  daily  life,  that 
cheerfulness,  consciousness  of  protection  and  friendly 
care  essential  to  his  cure. 

What  does  the  State  do  with  him  ?  Sends  him  to 
the  county  almshouse,  within  sight  of  his  own  home  ; — 
it  may  be  to  the  almshouse  which  he  has  been  taught 
to  dread  from  his  childhood  as  the  receptacle  of  all 
that  is  degraded  and  vile ;  forces  upon  him,  with  every 
hour,  his  own  damning  disgrace  in  the  eyes  of  his 
neighbors  (the  only  world  he  knows)  ;  teaches  the 
poor,  luckless  being,  sometimes  through  inhuman 
cruelty,  to  regard  himself  thenceforth  as  cast  out 
and  accursed  from  human  brotherhood,  as  the  lepers 
that  in  old  times  stood  without  the  gates,  crying  un 
clean  !  unclean  !  For  no  guilt  but  that  of  his  misfor 
tune,  he  is  visited  with  punishment  more  terrible  to 
him  than  death, — a  punishment  which,  from  the  pre 
vious  habits  of  thought  and  life  which  we  have  tried  to 
portray,  is  certain  to  fasten  his  malady  upon  him  irrevo 
cably. 

We  have  regarded  this  question,  so  far,  from  the  side 
of  the  insane  pauper,  in  the  light  of  humanity.  We 
shall  now  look  upon  it  from  the  stand-point  of  public 
interest,  and  hope  to  be  able  to  show  that  the  confine 
ment  of  this  large  body  of  useless  dependents  in  a 
position  where  "cure"  is  impossible,  is  no  less  disad 
vantageous  to  the  State  than  to  the  wretched  victims. 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  403 

First. — It  is  an  uncontroverted  fact,  established  by 
the  authoritative  statements  of  the  highest  medical 
experts,  without  dissent,  that  insanity  is  a  physical  dis 
ease  and  as  readily  curable  as  other  bodily  maladies. 

Secondly. — The  number  of  recent  cases  (cases  where 
the  disease  has  not  existed  over  three  months)  cured 
under  scientific  hospital  treatment  is  about  seventy- 
five  in  every  hundred,  in  the  first  six  months'  time. 
It  has  also  been  shown,  by  the  same  authority,  that  not 
over  seven  in  every  hundred  of  the  insane  confined  in 
the  ordinary  almshouses  leave  them  restored  to  health. 
Our  own  reports  state  that  eighty  per  cent,  of  the  in 
sane  in  the  State  are  held  as  incurable. 

Now,  if  seventy-five  per  cent,  are  curable  (as  they 
are,  according  to  scientific  computation,  tested  by  ex 
perience),  and  that  percentage  has  actually  been  cured 
in  our  own  hospitals,  the  only  explanation  of  this  ter 
rible  majority  of  incurables  in  Pennsylvania  is  their 
confinement  in  almshouses. 

We  would  point  out  as  matter  for  your  consideration, 
in  passing,  the  different  modes  of  treatment  of  this  class 
of  unfortunates  in  the  almshouses  and  hospitals,  both 
exercised  under  the  authority  of  the  State  ;  for  the 
State  makes  the  laws  which  control  the  action  of  the 
counties. 

The  almshouse  system  is  based  upon  the  old  theory 
by  which  the  mind  was  held  to  be  absolutely  apart 
from  the  body.  The  insane  man  was  held  by  the  an 
cients  to  be  possessed  by  a  god  or  a  demon,  and  was 
either  treated  with  reverential  homage,  and  his  maniac 
utterances  received  as  divine  oracles,  or  he  was  driven 


404  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

out,  as  a  thing  accursed,  from  human  habitations. 
Among  ourselves,  but  a  generation  ago,  insanity  was 
regarded  with  awe  and  dislike,  as  an  inscrutable  male 
diction  of  Providence,  belonging  to  the  emotional  or 
religious  life  of  man.  It  was  accounted  for  (as  sudden 
deaths  were  then  disposed  of  by  coroners'  juries)  as 
coming  "by  the  visitation  of  God."  The  almshouse 
system  is,  as  we  said,  still  based  upon  this  theory. 
The  unhappy  wretch,  cursed  by  this  visitation  of 
God,  is  given  a  straw  litter,  food  and  drink,  and  is 
locked  in  a  cell  covered  with  vermin,  to  wait  until  the 
same  mysterious  dispensation  of  power  shall  cure  or 
kill  him.  We  need  but  cite  as  proof  the  condition  of 
the  Philadelphia  Almshouse  Hospital  (as  favorable  an 
example  as  exists  in  the  State,  judiciously  governed  by 
a  skillful  and  humane  physician),  where,  owing  to  over 
crowding,  it  is  necessary  to  place  two  or  three  patients 
in  one  cell,  and  hand-cuff  them  to  prevent  their  injuring 
each  other,  and  where,  notwithstanding  the  hourly  visits 
of  attendants,  the  danger  of  murder  from  this  forced, 
unwholesome  contact,  is  reported  by  the  medical  su 
perintendent  as  imminent,  and  where  it  has  actually 
occurred  on  several  occasions.  Five  hundred  more 
patients  are  received  into  this  institution  than  its 
capacity  warrants.  Yet  this  is  our  model  almshouse, 
under  the  care  of  a  skilled  physician.  What  chance  of 
cure  is  there  here  for  the  lunatic,  hand-cuffed  to  keep 
him  from  killing  or  being  killed  ? 

The  common  sense  and  higher  religious  intelligence 
of  mankind  have  fortunately  discovered  that  in  this 
case,  as  in  every  other,  God  works  through  secondary 
causes, — that  insanity,  as  well  as  scrofula  or  tetanus, 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  405 

can  be  traced  to  physical  laws  and  their  violation.  The 
material  brain  which  is  the  mouth-piece  of  the  imma 
terial  mind,  is  found  to  be  subject  to  the  same  chemi 
cal  changes,  the  same  hygienic  influences,  as  the  liver 
or  the  stomach.  It  needs  medicine,  rest,  certain  kinds 
of  food  as  much  or  more  than  they.  A  guilty  man 
who  drops  dead  is  not  now  supposed  to  be  smitten  by 
the  suddenly-outstretched  hand  of  an  angry  God. 
"  After  death  it  is  found  that  the  cerebral  tissue  is  torn 
by  an  effusion  of  blood  into  substance."  When  this 
mouth-piece — this  mechanical  organ — is  out  of  order,  it 
necessarily  misrepresents  the  mind.  "The  organic 
affections  of  the  brain,"  says  an  eminent  medical  au 
thority,  "necessarily  modify  the  mental  conditions, 
not  only  by  destroying  the  efficiency  of  a  certain 
portion  of  the  tissue,  but  by  interfering  with  the  due 
performance  of  organic  changes  in  other  parts."  The 
researches  into  the  path  of  knowledge,  of  which  this  is 
but  the  starting  point,  have  been  vigorous  and  accurate. 
Not  only  is  it  a  matter  of  certainty  how  far  and  in  what 
manner  disorders  of  the  mind  may  affect  the  material 
organs,  but  also  the  reflex  action  of  the  diseased  body 
upon  the  thinking  power  is  at  last  subject  to  plain, 
practical  rules,  and  may  be  controlled  and  to  a  certain 
extent  hindered.  The  scientific  physician  can  not  only 
decide  how  far  the  unhealthy  action  of  the  mind  of  a 
morbid  or  visionary  man  is  due  to  lack  of  oxygen,  or 
surplus  of  bile  in  the  blood,  but  he  can  trace,  by  reasons 
founded  on  the  solid  basis  of  statistics,  the  great  major 
ity  of  cases  of  insanity  and  idiocy  to  tangible  causes. 
Cretinism  in  certain  European  countries  is  distinctly 
traceable  to  the  argillaceous  soil  and  enormous  deposits 


406  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

of  gypsum  in  the  hillsides ;  a  singular  form  of  melan 
choly  mania  prevalent  among  the  inhabitants  of  La 
Bresse  is  produced  by  the  malarious  air  of  the  marshes. 
M.  Esquirol  says  that  one-half  the  cases  of  insanity 
among  the  higher  classes  in  France,  and  one-third 
among  the  lower,  have  been  inherited  from  parents  or 
ancestors.  Seventy-seven  per  cent,  of  the  cases  at  the 
Bicetre  were  hereditary.  Epilepsy,  chorea,  all  neural 
diseases,  and  consumption  in  the  parents,  manifest 
themselves  in  insanity  in  the  children.  In  a  still  larger 
degree  chronic  alcoholism  in  one  generation  adds,  in 
the  next,  this  crowning,  most  terrible,  calamity  to  its 
deadly  fruit. 

The  point  and  force  of  these  statements  lie  in  the 
truth  that  insanity,  thus  traced  by  the  clear  eye  of 
science  to  its  physical  causes,  is,  like  any  other  malady 
primary  in  the  body,  open  to  cure  by  scientific  means. 
We  have  thus  reached  the  cause  of  the  fact  that  while 
seventy-five  per  cent,  of  "recent  cases,"  receiving 
scientific  treatment  in  our  hospitals,  are  curable,  eighty 
per  cent,  of  the  insane  in  Pennsylvania  are  pronounced 
incurable,  owing  to  their  detention  in  poor-houses. 

How  does  this  fact  affect  the  economy  of  the  State  ? 

Putting  the  question  of  humanity  aside,  it  may  seem 
at  first  view  cheaper  to  suffer  these  thousands  of  help 
less  human  beings  to  become  inmates  of  almshouses, 
than  to  subject  them  to  the  more  costly  treatment  of 
the  hospitals.  The  answer  is  a  matter  of  figures,  not 
sentiment,  and  we  will  now  endeavor  to  show  conclu 
sively  that  the  truest  economy  will  be  secured  by 
making  the  well-managed  hospital  the  sole  recipient 
of  every  insane  man,  woman,  and  child  in  the  Common- 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  407 

wealth,  and  by  making  such  legislative  provision  as 
will  furnish  accommodations  for  at  least  every  recent 
case  which  may  hereafter  occur. 

Whatever  errors  may  have  occurred  in  the  census  of 
1870  in  the  enumeration  of  the  insane  in  some  of  the 
States,  so  far  as  it  relates  to  the  number  in  the  State 
of  Pennsylvania  it  may  be  taken  as  sufficiently  cor 
rect  for  all  practical  purposes.  We  do  not  assume 
that  it  is  perfect,  for  that,  with  the  machinery  existing 
under  present  laws,  is  impossible ;  but  it  is  entitled  to 
confidence  as  regards  the  numbers  of  the  "unfortunate 
classes,"  particularly  the  insane,  until  disproved  by 
facts  gathered  under  a  more  systematic  agency.  In  a 
previous  report  made  to  your  honorable  bodies,  we 
stated  that,  "by  the  returns  on  file  in  this  office,  the 
number  of  insane  maintained  in  institutions,  or  by 
authorities  making  reports  to  the  Board  of  Public 
Charities,  on  September  3Oth,  1873,  was  three  thousand 
eight  hundred  and  forty-two.  It  is  estimated  that  there 
are  in  addition  about  six  hundred,  who  comprise  the 
increase  in  county  institutions  since  the  above  date, 
those  who  are  retained  under  family  care  and  those 
who  wander  about  as  outcasts,  making  a  total  of  four 

o 

thousand  four  hundred  and  forty-two."  In  the  census, 
the  number  of  insane  on  June  3Oth,  1870,  was  three 
thousand  eight  hundred  and  ninety-five ;  allowing  for 
the  increase  of  the  same,  on  September  3Oth,  1873,  they 
would  number  four  thousand  three  hundred  and  sixty- 
eight,  being  a  difference  of  but  seventy-four.  A  more 
remarkable  evidence  of  the  accuracy  of  the  census  is 
furnished  by  the  investigation  of  the  Board  of  State 
Commissioners  of  Public  Chanties  of  New  York,  in 


40  8  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

regard  to  the  number  of  this  afflicted  class  in  that  State. 
The  prosecution  of  the  inquiry  involved  the  addressing 
of  nearly  seven  thousand  written  and  printed  commu 
nications  to  physicians  and  officers  of  institutions.  The 
result  of  the  investigation  showed  that  there  were 
living  on  December  31  st,  1871,  according  to  the  reports, 
six  thousand  seven  hundred  and  seventy-five.  The 
census  of  June  3Oth,  1870,  enumerated  six  thousand 
three  hundred  and  fifty-three,  to  which  if  added  the 
number  obtained  from  the  rate  of  increase,  as  shown 
by  the  census  of  1870,  would,  on  December  3ist,  1871, 
give,  as  the  number  living,  six  thousand  seven  hundred 
and  thirty-three,  or  only  forty-two  less  than  the  number 
ascertained  by  the  investigation  of  the  Commissioners 
of  the  State  Board  of  Public  Charities  of  New  York. 
We  make  these  statements  as  confirmatory  of  our  view 
as  regards  Pennsylvania,  in  which  the  enumeration  of 
this  afflicted  class  is  sufficiently  accurate  to  furnish  a 
basis  for  any  legislation  for  their  proper  care  and  re 
medial  treatment. 

In  the  third  report  of  this  board,  we  stated  that  it 
may  be  expected  that  one  in  one  thousand  six  hundred 
and  ninety  persons  in  Pennsylvania  will  yearly  become 
insane.  This  statement,  emanating  from  the  high 
official  authority  of  medical  experts  on  the  subject,  was 
believed  at  the  time  to  be  correct ;  but  an  examina 
tion  of  the  returns  of  the  hospitals  for  the  insane,  in 
regard  to  their  admissions,  and  the  number  discharged 
therefrom  as  restored  or  died,  has,  in  connection 
with  our  proved  practical  accuracy  of  enumeration  of 
this  class  of  unfortunates,  given  us  reasons  for  be 
lieving  that  about  one  in  three  thousand  nine  hundred 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  409 

and  eighty-six  of  the  population  of  Pennsylvania 
annually  becomes  insane  ;  that  one  in  one  thousand  six 
hundred  and  ninety  does  not,  is  clearly  shown,  thus : — 

On  June  3Oth,  1863,  there  were  in  Pennsylvania, 
according  to  the  annual  increase,  as  shown  by  the 
census,  three  thousand  and  sixty-seven  insane  persons. 
Upon  the  basis  that  one  in  one  thousand  six  hundred 
and  ninety  of  the  population  becomes  insane  annually, 
there  would  be  developed  from  1864  to  1873  twenty 
thousand  two  hundred  and  seventy-five  cases  of  in 
sanity,  which,  added  to  the  number  remaining  from 
the  preceding  year,  would  give  twenty-three  thousand 
three  hundred  and  forty-two  cases  in  ten  years. 

If  this  was  true,  what  became  of  them  ?  From  the 
returns  of  the  State  Lunatic  Hospital  at  Harrisburg, 
Western  Pennsylvania  Hospital  at  Dixmont,  Friends' 
Asylum  at  Frankford,  Pennsylvania  Hospital  (Kirk- 
bride's),  and  the  Philadelphia  Hospital,  there  were  re 
stored  in  these  five  institutions  three  thousand  four 
hundred  and  ninety-four,  and  one  thousand  nine  hun 
dred  and  eighty-one  died  within  the  same  period,  viz., 
1864  to  1873,  leaving  a  balance  of  seventeen  thousand 
eight  hundred  and  sixty-seven  cases,  according  to  the 
above  computation,  to  be  accounted  for.  Of  this  num 
ber,  we  know  from  our  returns  and  investigations  that 
there  were  not  four  thousand  four  hundred  and  forty- 
two  living  on  September  3<Dth,  1873,  leaving  a  balance 
to  have  died,  or  been  cured  in  almshouses  or  families, 
of  thirteen  thousand  four  hundred  and  twenty-five. 
This  statement  alone  is  sufficient  to  show  how  mis 
taken  is  the  estimate  that  one  in  one  thousand  six  hun 
dred  and  ninety  of  the  population  becomes  insane. 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

[We  note  in  passing,  in  regard  to  the  hospitals  for  the 
insane,  that  the  low  percentage  of  cures  is  due  to  the 
fact  that  but  one-half  of  the  patients  received  had  the 
disease  for  less  than  one  year  prior  to  their  admission.] 
In  illustration  of  our  theory  as  to  the  probable  per 
centage  of  new  cases  of  insanity,  we  present  the  follow 
ing  table,  giving  the  population  and  number  who  should 
have  become  annually  insane  upon  the  basis  of  one  to 
one  thousand  six  hundred  and  ninety,  during  the 
decade  from  1864  to  1875,  inclusive  :— 


Will  become 

RESTORED    OR    DIED    IN    FIVE 

insane  annu 

HOSPITALS. 

YEARS. 

Population. 

ally   on    the 

basis  of  i  in 
1690. 

Restored. 

Died. 

Total. 

1864,    . 

3^38,385 

1.857 

335        215 

55° 

l86q, 

3>I99>27° 

1.893 

380        223 

603 

1866 

3.261,336)       J>929 

301        204 

5°5 

1867,    . 

•3,724,606 

1,967 

^Si        216 

^67 

1868,   

-2,  ^8Q,  IO3 

2.ooc; 

^oc;         100 

S8<; 

i860,    . 

3,454,852              2,044 

339 

210 

549 

1870,   

3.521,95! 

2,084 

347 

157 

5°4 

1871,    

3.590?277i             2,124 

38i 

207 

588 

1872,   

3,659,928              2,l65 

366 

200    |       566 

1873.    

3.73Q.931 

2,207 

299 

159            458 

Number  become  insane  in  ten  years, 

20,275 

3.494 

I,98l 

5.475 

Add  number  remaining  insane  from 

186-*,  , 

-3,067 

Insane  population  for  ten  years,  . 

23.    42 

Deduct  restored  and  died  in  hospit 

als, 

5.475 

There  were    not  over  this  number 

17,867 

living  September  3oth,  1873,  •  • 

4,442 

Leaving   as    restored    or    died    in 

almshouses  and  private  families, 

13.425 

CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 


411 


As  we  have  already  stated,  it  may  be  assumed, 
as  near  an  approximation  to  the  truth  as  can  possibly 
be  now  obtained,  that  one  in  three  thousand  nine 
hundred  and  eighty-six  of  the  population  of  Penn 
sylvania  annually  becomes  insane.  In  verification  of 
this  estimate  we  present  the  following  table,  exhibit 
ing  the  number  of  cases  developed  annually,  with 
the  aggregate  insane  population  from  the  year  1864 
to  1873:— 


YEARS. 

Population. 

Number    will 
become     in 
sane  annual 
ly  on  the  ba 
sis    of    i    in 
3986. 

Aggregate  in 
sane  popula 
tion. 

l864 

1,  1  "?8    ^8^ 

787 

-Z   8^A 

186=;, 

O>  Aou>o>JD 
•3,100,270 

7°7 
802 

v5>°:>4 
i  076 

1866,     

^,26l,^76 

818 

o»y  i  w 

4,10-2 

1867, 

3,324,606 

8^4. 

A,  214. 

1868 

-7    ?RQ    io^ 

"OT- 

Qr0 

A   760 

i860, 

o'o^y?  AWo 
•Z,AZA.8Z2 

867 

4»3uy 

A    COQ 

l870.     .      , 

1..Z2I.QZ  i 

884 

^-jj^y 
4,6^  1 

1871. 

•3,^00,277 

QOI 

A,  706 

l8?2. 

•7    6CQ   Q28 

y   J 

OTQ 

40  An 

l87l, 

o>wjy>y  •*<- 
"*,  7^0,0^1 

Q  "^6 

Wry 

z  108 

yo^ 

Will  become  insane  in  ten  year 

s,  

8,597 

If  to  the  eight  thousand  five  hundred  and  ninety- 
seven  who,  in  consonance  with  our  computation, 
became  insane  in  ten  years,  we  add  three  thousand 
and  sixty-seven  as  the  number  remaining  from  the  year 
1863,  it  will  give  a  total  of  eleven  thousand  six  hun 
dred  and  sixty-four  as  the  insane  population  for  ten 
years. 


412 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 


It  is  important  for  us  now  to  inquire  how  many  were 
restored,  how  many  died,  and  the  probable  number  re 
maining  at  the  end  of  the  decade.  The  next  table  will 
show  these  facts,  thus  :  — 


YEARS. 

Aggregate  in 
sane     popu 
lation. 

IN   HOSPITALS. 

OUT   OF    HOSPITALS. 

Total    of 
restored 
and  died. 

Number 
remaining 
insane. 

Restored. 

Died. 

Restored. 

Died. 

I864,   .     . 

3>854 

299 

159 

120 

102 

680 

3,T74 

I865).      . 

3,97-6        366 

2OO 

67 

58 

691 

3,285 

1866.    .      . 

4,103        381 

207 

62 

53        703 

3,4oo 

I867,    .      . 

4,234        347 

157 

114 

97 

715 

3,5*9 

1868,    .      . 

4,369  i     339 

210                96 

82 

727 

3,642 

l869,    .      . 

4,509        395 

190 

84 

7i 

740 

3,769 

1870,   .      . 

4,653 

351 

216 

I03 

88 

758 

3,895 

I87I,    .      . 

4,796 

301 

204 

I4O 

120 

765 

4,031 

I872,    .      . 

4,949 

380 

223 

94 

80 

777 

4,172 

1873,    •      • 

5,108 

335 

2I5 

130 

110 

79° 

4,3i8 

Here  we  learn  that  of  the  eleven  thousand  six  hun 
dred  and  sixty-four  insane,  four  thousand  five  hundred 
and  four — 38.51  per  cent. — were  restored,  and  two 
thousand  eight  hundred  and  forty-two,  or  24.36  per  cent., 
died,  leaving  four  thousand  three  hundred  and  eighteen 
insane  on  June  3Oth,  1873.  The  number  based  upon 
our  own  returns  would  be  four  thousand  three  hundred 
and  ninety-two. 

We  now  inquire  whether  any  additional  accommoda 
tions  in  the  form  of  hospitals  are  needed.  The  increase 
of  the  insane  population  of  1873  over  that  of  1864 
was  36.04  per  cent,  while  the  increase  of  the  sane 
population,  for  the  same  period,  was  only  18.88  per 
cent.: — 


CARE    OF   THE  INSANE. 


413 


1864. 

Increase. 

1873. 

• 

Sane  population,  .... 
Insane   population,  . 

3,138,385 
3,X74 

18.88  per  cent. 
36.04 

3.730,931 
4,318 

Although  such  is  the  fact,  it  would  be  erroneous  to 
infer  that  all  the  recent  cases  are  sent  to  the  hospitals 
and  the  balance  of  the  admissions  made  up  of  chronic 
cases. 

The  following  table  will  show  to  what  extent  recent 
and  chronic  cases  are  admitted  into  the  hospitals : — 


YEARS. 

Number 
resident 
in    the 
hospitals 
at  begin 
ning  of 
year. 

Duration  of  disease  before  admission 
of  those  received  during  the  year. 

Per  cent,  on 
admissions 
of  those 
whose  dis 
ease  was 
under  twelve 
months. 

Annual  pop 
ulation    of 
insane    in 
the  hospit 
als. 

Under 
twelve 
months. 

Above 
twelve 
months. 

Total. 

1864,     .     .     . 

J,293 

360 

451 

811 

44.4 

2,104 

1865,     .     .      . 

1,346 

412 

472 

884 

46.6 

2,230 

1866,     .     .     . 

1,442 

473 

5°3 

976 

48.5 

2,418 

I867,     .     .     . 

i,453 

489 

532 

1,021 

47-9 

2,474 

1868,     .     .     . 

1,616 

5M 

508 

1,022 

5o-3 

2,638 

l869,     .     .     . 

MI9 

503 

560 

1,063 

47-3 

2,782 

1870,     .     .     . 

i,835 

537 

572 

1,109 

48.4 

2,944 

1871,     .     .     . 

1,996 

578 

521 

1,099 

52.6 

3,095 

1872,     .     .     . 

2,166 

591 

613 

1,204 

49.1 

3,370 

1873,     .     .     . 

2,274 

520 

595 

i»"5 

46.6 

3,389 

Totals,    . 

.    .    . 

4,977 

5,327 

10,304 

48.3 

Thus  we  see  how  our  hospitals  are  rapidly  filled  with 
unfortunate  patients  whose  duration  of  disease  was  of 
one,  two,  three,  four,  five  years  and  upwards,  who  can 
not  but  become  a  lifelong  expense  to  the  public.  We 
have,  for  the  purpose  of  this  paper,  in  the  above  table, 
considered  as  "  recent "  cases  those  whose  disease 


414 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 


before  admission  was  under  twelve  months,  compared 
with  others  existing  over  twelve  months. 

It  is  but  proper  to  state  that  many  experts  in  the 
treatment  of  this  disease  limit  the  term  of  "  recent " 
cases  to  the  class  in  which  the  malady  existed  for  only 
six  months  or  less.  The  highest  authorities,  as  Tuke, 
Esquirol,  Pinel,  and  others,  agree  that  the  average 
time  in  which  a  chance  of  cure  may  be  expected  is  less 
than  one  year,  and  after  the  third  year  the  probability 
of  cure  is  at  the  rate  of  about  one-eighth  of  one  per 
cent. 

We  now  inquire  what  has  been  the  result  of  treat 
ment  in  our  hospitals  ? 


YEARS. 

Annual 
population 
of  insane 
in  the  five 
hospitals. 

Per  cent,  on  the  whole  number  treated 
who  were  discharged  as  — 

Total 
number 
discharged. 

Number   re 
maining  at 
the  end  of 
the  year. 

Restored. 

Died. 

Improved 
and 
unimproved. 

I864,     -      .      - 

2,104    |      14.21 

7.56 

14.26                  758 

^346 

l865,     .      .      . 

2,230  !    16.41 

8-97 

9.96                  788 

1,442 

1866,     .      .      . 

2,4l8    |      15.76 

8.56 

15-59                  965 

i»453 

1867,    .    .    .  S   2,474  |    14.02 

6-35 

J4-3J 

858 

1,616 

1868,    .    .    . 
1869,        .    . 

2,638         12.85 
2,782          14.20 

9.96 
6.83 

14.03             919 
13.01            947 

1,719 

1,835 

1870,    .    .    . 

2,944      11.92 

7-34 

12.94            948 

1,996 

1871,    .    .    . 

3.095        9-72 

6.60 

13.70            929 

2,166 

1872,    .    .    . 

3,370       11.28 

6.62 

14.60         1,096 

2,274 

1873,    .    •    • 

3,389 

9.88 

6-35 
7-3i 

13.60 

1,011 

2,378 

Totals,    . 

I3-°3 

13.60 

9,2I9 

The  result  of  the  neglect  of  early  treatment  is 
strikingly  exhibited  in  the  above  table,  which  shows 
that  of  the  population  or  number  annually  treated/ an 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  415 

average  of  only  13.03  were  restored,  7.31  per  cent, 
died,  and  13.60  per  cent,  discharged  as  improved  and 
unimproved.  This  population,  as  we  have  shown,  is 
largely  composed  of  chronic  insane ;  eighteen  to 
twenty  per  cent,  of  the  annual  admissions  are  re- 
admissions,  and  in  only  48.3  per  cent,  the  disease  had 
existed  for  one  year  or  less.  It  cannot  be  doubted 
that  much  better  results  under  more  favorable  auspices 
would  be  obtained.  All  diseases  in  their  incipient 
stages  are  readily  manageable,  and  insanity  is  not  an 
exception. 

In  the  Journal  of  Insanity,  1870,  page  379,  it  is 
stated,  "that  when  patients  are  subject  to  early  and 
judicious  treatment  in  the  first  stages  of  this  disease, 
from  eighty  to  ninety  per  cent,  will  recover."  We 
have  cautiously  stated  in  a  previous  report  that  "  about 
seventy-five  per  cent,  of  recent  cases  of  insanity  will 
be  cured  in  the  first  six  or  twelve  months,  if  placed 
under  proper  and  skillful  treatment  in  our  best  hos 
pitals,"  while  "  in  poor-houses  not  more  than  seven 
per  cent,  will  be  cured  in  twelve  months."  This,  we 
believe,  is  a  fact  admitted  without  a  dissenting  voice. 
What  then  would  have  been  the  result  had  there  been 
ample  accommodation  for  the  reception  of  all  the 
insane  for  the  period  named,  viz.,  1864  to  1873,  with  a 
compulsory  law  requiring  that  these  hospitals  should  be 
used,  or  equally  adequate  measures  for  their  restora 
tion  ?  Take  the  case  of  the  8597,  which,  as  we  have 
shown  on  page  411,  is  the  probable  number  who 
would  have  become  insane  from  1863  to  1874,  and 
assume  that  seventy-five  per  cent,  or  6447  would  re 
cover  ;  at  an  expense  of  three  dollars  per  week  for 


4*6  CMtff  OJF  TJffJK  JM&4WJR. 

twenty-six  weeks  (the  average  term  of  treatment^  it 
wonuild  amount  to  .      $50^866 

The  remainder.  2150  incurables*  to  be  pro 
vided  for,  during  an  insane  life  of  eighteen 
years,  at  a  cost  of  $3  per  week,  would 
"-^  *     6,037,200 


Total  cost  of  hospital  treatment  of 

$597  insane  persons,     %  .  $6,540^066 


On  the  other  hand  supposing  these  8597  insane 
persons  had  been  disposed  of  in  the  poor-houses, 
seven  per  cent,  or  602,  would  recover  in  twelve 
months.  At  die  rate  of  $1.50  each  per  week,  the 

^ 


Leaving  die  remainder,  7995,  as  chronic 
insane,  to  be  supported  for  say  eighteen 
years,  at  $1*50  per  week,  which  would 
-  :  ::  ...   11,224,980 


Total  cost  of  poor-house  or  no  treat- 

$11,271,932 


This  shows  a  dear  saving  of  $4,731,866.  Further 
more,  as  it  costs  the  community  or  State  to  rear  one  of 
its  ineotbers  from  birth,  to  the  time  when  he  earns  more 
than  he  consumes,  the  sum  of  $500,  then  die  first  cost 
of  die  seven  thousand  nine  hundred  and  ninety-five 
chronk  insane  was  $5,997,500*  and  if  we  assume  that  they 
would  have  earned,  if  they  had  continued  sane,  on  an 


CARE  OF  THE  INSANE.  417 

average  one  hundred  dollars  per  annum  in  excess  of 
what  they  would  hare  consumed,  supposing  they 
had  lived  eighteen  years,  it  would  hare  amounted  to 
$14,391,000,  winch  would  have  added  so  much  to  the 
wealth  of  the  State,  This  constructive  Iocs  added  to 
the  first  cost,  amounts  to  $18,288,500,  But  under 
hospital  treatment,  supposing  that  only  two  thousand 
one  hundred  and  fifty  should  remain  incurable,  there 
would  be,  by  the  same  calculation,  a  loss  or  cost  to  the 
State  of  $4,945,000,  which  added  to  the  amount  saved 
by  hospital  treatment  makes  an  aggregate  of  $9,676,- 
8  66,  or  a  gain  of  that  much  to  the  wealth  and  power 
of  the  community,  which  has  to  a  large  extent  (we 
may  safely  say  one-half)  been  lost  to  the  Slate  few- 
want  of  ample  hospital  accommodations,  where  die 

'     •-..'  •';    V.  ,    ',    '  c.     •':    '-':',-':      ':':    iC/:',  .  '-,  '  :    ^  '  '.       -  ,      "  -.  : 

men  t  For  we  find  that  instead  of  eight  thousand  fire 
hundred  and  ninety-seven  being  sent  to  the  hospitals  as 

-.'.'.'     -, .'.    :>.-':    '."    .--I-     •:        c       -;'-':     •-:'-.:_•';•-      I:.-':'':       ':'•':   '.  '    : '  '.     - 

whose  disease  had  existed  for  twelve  months  or  kss, 

',  '          :'-_,'    V'.,     c~.      '    '  ••;      ','.'-•'.     •-_'-.      ;.-':     •':':     -.-':     -':  '. 

c  '  r.-:'J  c '  ,  ". "  ::  ;  '..".  '.  :  .  '.'."'.:  '.  '  \  :  •  -•;  -  '.  > 
:,  :i  ;.  -  .  :-  :  :  .;  :  -':  :.  ".;.-'  ;'c  ^:  -,:  -.  '  ;-  - 
:,i*.:-:r.:  ^'  '."  ":c  '.^'.';  ::.-:: r  : " :;'-.:~  •-.- :  -.  .  :  ^ 

-':'         ".i        '.-:-.'::-.'.':^:-.     --,.  •':    >.c.     -'::''.'.       '  ':"':    '..'--. 

We  urge  a  very  careful  attention  to  and  also  criticism 
of  the  above  demonstration. 

If  tl*i<  «fr«ti^»  state  of  things  <ffffriffifffy  we  may  wefl 

'. ',  ,  ..•"•":     '•:'--'.          ..      -•':     *..'.-':     .':  .  -  . ".     '.    *. '  •':    "    :     :    '.:-.'^-:_     '.' 

from  187410  1883? 

.:-.--:  •'',:::    -/  ii"-:-':    ::  -:--.    -:--  -----^.i  -.-.-. . . 

:  '. '     : ' .  -:    '.-". '.--.'    '. ' '-- \  '.  ".  \ '-, '.       ', ':  •.  •.  "  ^; 


4i8 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 


the  aggregate  insane  population,  with  the  number  that 
will  probably  remain  in  the  middle  of  each  year : — 


YEARS. 

Population. 

Number  will 
become     in 
sane  annually 
on    the    basis 
of  i  in  3986. 

Aggregate 
insane    popu 
lation. 

Estimated 
will  remain 
insane  in  mid 
dle     of    each 
year. 

l8?/t 

3,803,311 

3>877,°95 
3*952*3H 
4,028,986 

4,107,148 
4,186,827 
4,268,051 
4,350,851 
4,435*258 
4,521,302 

954 
972 
992 

,011 

,030 
,050 
,071 
,092 

,JI3 
,134 

5>272 
5*441 

5,6i7 
5579S 

5,985 
6,178 

6,378 
6,585 
6,798 
7,018 

4,469 
4,625 
4,787 

4,955 
5,128 

5,307 
5,493 
5,685 
5*884 
6,090 

187^ 

1876 

l877,    . 

l878. 

l87O 

l88o                                 .... 

1881 

1882,  

1883,  . 

t"-'O» 

Estimated  number  who  will  become  insane  in  ten  years, 
Add  number  remaining  insane  in  1873, 


10,419 


Total, 14,737 


The  population  of  the  State,  and  of  the  insane  in  the 
above  table,  are  estimated  upon  the  ratio  of  increase 
as  shown  by  the  census  of  1870.  and  exhibits  some 
important  facts  for  the  consideration  of  philanthropists. 
Upon  the  basis  that  one  in  three  thousand  nine 
hundred  and  eighty-six  become  insane  annually,  there 
will  be  developed  in  ten  years,  from  1874  to  1883,  ten 
thousand  four  hundred  and  nineteen  cases  of  insanity. 
These,  added  to  the  number  remaining  insane  from 
1873,  viz.,  four  thousand  three  hundred  and  eighteen, 
will  make  a  total  of  fourteen  thousand  seven  hundred 
and  thirty-seven.  Of  this  number  we  estimate  that, 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  419 

including  the  hospital  at  Danville,  which  went  into 
operation  in  1873  (the  number  restored  outside  of  the 
hospitals  being  in  proportion  about  the  same  as  in  the 
preceding  decade),  five  thousand  and  sixty-four  will  be 
restored,  and  three  thousand  five  hundred  and  eighty- 
three  will  die,  leaving  in  the  middle  of  the  year  1883 
six  thousand  and  ninety  insane  persons  living.  It  will 
thus  be  observed  that  the  insane  population  would  be 
increased  from  four  thousand  four  hundred  and  sixty- 
nine,  in  1874,  to  six  thousand  and  ninety  at  the  end  of 
the  decade,  under  the  system  of  treatment  now  in 
operation. 

This  growing  burden  upon  the  resources  of  the 
Commonwealth  imperatively  demands  that  immediate 
measures  be  taken  to  lessen  the  number  of  these 
unfortunates.  In  other  words,  that  the  current  system 
respecting  them  be  revolutionized  by  proper  legislation. 

It  is  the  interest  of  the  State,  as  well  as  the  demand 
of  humanity,  that  this  should  be  effected.  Dr.  Jarvis 
has  stated  in  the  fifth  report  of  the  Board  of  Health  of 
Massachusetts,  page  382: — "  If  the  persons  who  are 
attacked  with  this  disorder  are  as  promptly  cared  for  as 
others  when  attacked  with  fever,  dysentery ',  pneumonia, 
eighty  or  ninety  per  cent,  can  be  restored  to  health  and 
usefulness  ;  but,  if  neglected,  the  disease  tends  rapidly  to 
fix  itself  upon  the  brain,  and  becomes  more  and  more 
difficult  to  remove.  If  allowed  to  remain  one  year, 
the  chance  of  restoration  is  materially  diminished.  In 
two  years  this  hope  is  reduced  more  than  half  ;  and  after 
five  years  duration  few  are  restored,  and  even  then  it  is 
due  to  some  unexpected  turn  of  the  disease,  rather  than 
the  result  of  healing  remedies" 


420  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

It  is  thus  clearly  demonstrable  that  the  economic 
interests  of  the  State  are  largely  concerned  in  uproot 
ing  the  past  and  re-establishing  a  future  for  this  class 
of  dependents,  which  shall  not  only  restore  them  to  the 
power  of  self-support  and  family  support,  but  also 
shall  gladden  many  lives  upon  which  gloom  and  misery 
now  perpetually  lower  and  depress.  It  is  a  most  dis 
couraging  task  to  undertake  the  proposed  revolution. 
We  estimate  that  there  are  now  in  this  Common 
wealth  four  thousand  four  hundred  and  sixty-nine 
insane  persons,  and  that  of  these  three  thousand  five 
hundred  and  seventy-six  are  incurable.  The  dis 
couragement  which  is  felt  in  contemplating  such  a 
state  of  things  is  simply  overwhelming.  It  exceeds 
even  that  which  one  feels  in  regarding  the  increase  of 
the  criminal  or  the  pauper  class ;  and  we  are  less  in 
sensible  to  it  only  because  the  former  are  regarded  as 
further  beyond  the  pale  of  human  consideration  than 
the  selected  few  who  are  their  keepers.  The  public 
interest  and  the  active  public  sympathy  decline,  be 
cause  of  the  false  notion  which  exists,  that  these 
stricken  members  of  the  community  are  doomed  to 
desertion  by  the  "  mysterious "  malady  which  has 
overpowered  and  obscured  their  reason,  while  it  hap 
pens  that  every  day  we  are  enjoying  domestic  comfort, 
sharing  business  enterprises,  or  taking  counsel  with 
many,  who  have  at  some  time  been  members  of  the 
very  class  who,  by  a  false  public  impression,  become 
as  estranged  from  public  care  and  thought  as  are  the 
mummies  in  the  Egyptian  catacombs. 

Having  proved  conclusively,  as  we  think,  that  some 
other  method  than  that  heretofore  used  by  the  State 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  421 

must  be  tried  (unless  we  accept  the  alternative,  which 
plainly  confronts  us,  of  a  great  and  increasing  aggre 
gate  of  unrelieved  suffering  and  disease,  and  a  corres 
ponding  expenditure  of  public  funds  for  the  mainte 
nance  of  their  victims),  we  turn  to  the  suggestion  of  a 
plan  by  which  we  believe  the  remedy  may  be  applied 
with  benefit  to  the  treasury  of  the  people,  as  well  as  to 
the  stricken  and  helpless  beings  whose  sad  woes  ap 
peal  to  every  heart,  not  only  for  sympathy,  but  for  sure 
and  permanent  relief. 

Past  experience  has  demonstrated  that  the  legisla 
ture  will  not  build  costly  hospitals  fast  enough  to 
receive  the  gathering  increase  of  the  insane,  and  espe 
cially  for  the  reception  of  the  population  of  the  various 
poor-houses,  who  are  so  imperfectly  cared  for  in  the 
best  conditions  of  such  houses  of  detention.  Outlays 
for  these  structures  have  come  to  be  of  magnificent 
proportions;  so  much  so,  that  the  legislature  of  1872 
felt  constrained,  by  economical  considerations,  to  re 
fuse,  for  that  year,  all  pecuniary  aid  towards  the  com 
pletion  of  the  Danville  Hospital,  although  the  needs  of 
the  insane  for  hospital  accommodation  were  sore  and 
pressing. 

This  is  not  surprising  when  we  discover  that  the  cost 
of  such  infirmaries  for  the  sick  poor  are  so  enormous, 
and  the  length  of  time  required  for  their  construction 
so  great.  Patience  becomes  exhausted,  and  liberality 
receives  a  natural  check. 

But  if  the  legislature  becomes  informed  of  the  real 
condition  of  its  helpless  wards,  by  frank  and  honest 
statement  concerning  them  ;  if,  knowing  their  needs,  it 
is  shown  a  reasonable  plan  for  their  relief,  quick  in 


422  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

application  and  attainable  without  extravagance,  the 
question  of  its  readiness  to  accept  and  carry  out  such 
a  measure  without  delay  cannot,  we  think,  be  doubted. 

Such  a  scheme  we  are  now  prepared  to  recommend, 
after  full  deliberation.  It  consists  in  the  establishment, 
on  the  grounds  of  each  of  the  State  hospitals  for  the 
insane,  detached  buildings,  near  enough  to  the  main 
institutions  for  convenience,  for  the  accommodation  of 
say  two  hundred  of  each  sex  of  the  chronic,  and  for  the 
most  part  quiet,  patients,  whose  number  is  always 
largely  in  excess  in  all  of  our  hospitals. 

These  houses  can  be  built  substantially,  and  in  per 
fect  adaptation  to  their  uses  (and  in  accord,  also,  if 
necessary,  with  the  architectural  character  of  the  main 
building),  for  $500  per  patient,  including  furniture  and 
every  appliance  and  appurtenance  demanded  for  their 
proper  administration.  They  might  consist  of  a  single 
structure  for  each  department,  to  accommodate  two 
hundred  patients,  or,  as  in  the  case  of  the  Willard 
Asylum  for  the  Insane,  in  the  State  of  New  York,  of 
groups  of  buildings  for  each  department,  with  accom 
modations  for  fifty  patients  each;  which  is  preferred  by 
the  managers  of  that  institution  and  its  most  able  and 
efficient  medical  superintendent,  Dr.  John  B.  Chapin. 
These  extensions  would  be,  of  course,  under  the  con 
trolling  authority  of  the  physician-in-chief,  but  they 
would  be  directly  managed  by  a  superintendent  and 
matron,  and  ordinarily  visited  by  an  assistant  physician 
of  the  institution.  The  cost  of  "living"  accommoda 
tions  for  these  four  hundred  patients  by  our  proposed 
plan  would  be  $200,000.  The  average  estimated  cost 
of  the  Danville  Hospital,  by  builders,  was  $1,200,000, 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  423 

with  the  originally  intended  provision  for  five  hundred 
inmates,  and  without  furniture.  Its  actual  cost  and  its 
ultimate  extent  cannot  be  accurately  estimated. 

It  will  not  be  difficult,  moreover,  to  compute  the  sav 
ing  in  the  expense  of  maintenance  and  treatment  of 
the  inmates  under  the  proposed  management.  The 
present  weekly  cost,  as  stated  in  the  reports  of  the 
medical  superintendents,  is  about  four  dollars  and 
eighty-five  cents  per  caput.  We  estimate  the  cost, 
under  the  system  we  now  respectfully  submit  to  your 
honorable  bodies,  not  to  exceed  three  dollars  and  fifty 
cents  per  caput.  As  to  the  ability  of  the  chief  to  con 
duct  an  institution  of  such  capacity  as  is  herein  indi 
cated,  we  need  only  point  to  the  hospital  for  the  insane 
connected  with  the  Philadelphia  almshouse,  in  which 
are  maintained  over  eleven  hundred  patients:  as  large 
a  proportion  of  the  curable  class  as  in  the  State  hos 
pital,  and  with  a  want  of  almost  every  desirable  feature 
for  convenient  or  successful  administration. 

We  quote  here  some  passages  from  the  last  report 
of  the  Willard  Asylum  for  the  Insane,  bearing  most 
pertinently  upon  this  very  important  question  : — 

"The  number  of  insane  persons  in  the  asylum  on 
the  twentieth  day  of  November,  1874,  was  nine  hun 
dred.  The  number  of  patients  occupying  single  rooms 
was  two  hundred  and  ten  ;  the  remainder  occupied 
associated  dormitories.  No  casualty  occurred  during 
the  night,  and  in  my  observation  injuries  are  inflicted 
by  the  insane  more  frequently  in  the  day-time.  We 
record  the  experience  of  another  year  in  confirmation 
of  the  opinion  entertained  that  a  large  proportion  of 
the  chronic  insane  may  be  cared  for  in  this  manner 


424  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

without  disturbance  or  dano-er  to  each  other:  the  noise 

o 

and  turbulence  of  the  insane  being  due  principally  to 
the  presence  of  acute  cases.  We  have  passed  through 
the  wards,  and  about  the  buildings  at  night,  without 
hearing  more  than  one  or  two  voices,  and  frequently 
entire  quiet  prevails. 

"A  number  of  cases  have  been  brought  here  during 
the  year,  and  forever  released  from  the  restraint  of 
chains  and  noisome  cells.  A  single  case,  that  of  an 
unknown  foreigner,  deserves  a  passing  mention  from 
the  fact  that  he  bears  the  marks  of  former  respect 
ability  and  intelligence,  who  was  released  from  the 
heavy  chains  which  he  had  worn  about  his  legs  for  a 
period  of  nineteen  years — a  fate  which  rarely  falls  to 
the  lot  of  the  most  hardened  felons  in  countries  less 
civilized  than  ours.  Since  the  admission  of  this  person 
he  has  occupied  a  room  with  others,  and  is  harmless. 
We  could  record  many  similar  cases,  and  fear  that 
other  instances  exist  in  the  State..  We  have  specu 
lated  upon  the  causes  which  have  led  to  the  imposition 
of  such  painful  restraint  upon  these  wretched  persons 
over  long  periods,  and  infer  it  has,  perhaps,  followed  a 
single  outbreak  of  maniacal  violence,  which  is  handed 
down  among  the  traditions  of  the  establishment  and 
neighborhood  to  excite  an  apprehension  of  repetition. 
These  facts  should  be  commended  to  journalists,  and 
engage  the  attention  of  others  who  are  in  the  habit  of 
arousing  the  public  mind  to  the  abuses  and  wrongs  of 
the  insane. 

"  Dr.  Hoyt,  secretary  of  the  State  Board  of  Public 
Charities,  informs  me,  in  a  recent  letter,  that  he  'found 
two  hundred  and  thirteen  insane  locked  in  cells  or 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  425 

chained  (in  an  insane  population  of  one  thousand  five 
hundred  and  twenty-eight)  in  the  county  poor-houses, 
when  visited  by  me  (him)  in  1868.  Most  of  these,  it 
was  said,  had  been  so  restrained  for  a  long  time,  and 
many  of  them  for  several  years.  They  were  generally 
filthy,  violent,  and  destructive,  and  several  were  entirely 
nude.' 

"'The  number  of  insane  at  present  in  the  county 
poor-houses  is  nearly  as  large  as  in  1868,  but  they  are 
in  a  much  better  condition.  During  the  present  year 
I  have  visited  about  forty  of  these  institutions.  I 
found  several  insane  in  some  form  of  restraint,  but 
observed  none  in  chains,  and  but  few  locked  in  cells.' 

" '  I  attribute  this  improvement  in  the  condition  of  the 
insane  under  local  care,  to  the  removal  of  the  more 
violent  and  disturbed  cases  to  the  Willard  Asylum. 
There  is  still  urgent  need  for  more  accommodation  for 
the  chronic  insane/ 

"  We  are  gratified  to  be  able  to  present  this  official 
statement,  indicative  of  an  improved  public  sentiment 
toward  this  unfortunate  class.  We  trust  it  can  soon 
be  announced  that  this  practice  of  caring  for  the  insane 
has  been  effectually  abolished  throughout  the  State. 

"  One  very  serious  objection  heretofore  made  against 
our  public  buildings  for  charitable  purposes  has  been 
their  cost,  hence  the  satisfaction  we  feel  in  presenting 
the  actual  facts  and  successful  operations  of  these  less 
expensive,  yet  substantial  and  comfortable,  buildings 
for  the  care  of  the  insane.  Their  reasonable  cost  ob 
viates  the  objection,  for,  when  good  homes  can  be 
provided  for  the  pauper  insane  of  the  State,  at  $500 
per  capita,  who  will  complain  or  object  ?  And  when 


426  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

to  this  is  added  their  support  in  comfort  and  safety,  at 
an  actual  cost  of  three  dollars  per  week,  who  will  not 
commend  the  system  which  has  led  to  such  a  result, 
and  rejoice  in  a  charity  which  has  rescued  so  many 
from  the  ill-provided  poor-houses  of  the  State  ?  One 
great  object  aimed  at  by  the  establishment  of  this 
asylum,  and  by  connecting  with  it  the  cottage  system 
of  buildings,  was  to  reduce  the  expense  both  of  build 
ing  and  care.  The  result  has  fully  met  our  expecta 
tions,  and  has,  we  think,  assured  the  complete  success 
of  the  great  and  humane  enterprise  of  providing  better 
homes  for  the  chronic  pauper  insane  than  the  poor- 
houses  and  the  jails  of  the  counties  where  necessity 
had  compelled  their  confinement. 

"  By  centralizing  at  the  main  asylum  the  general 
management,  and  by  doing  at  the  same  place  the 
baking  and  laundry-work  for  all  the  buildings,  much 
expense  is  avoided,  and  more  vigorous  supervision  and 
accountability  secured.  To  this  fact  we  attribute  much 
of  the  success  here,  and  upon  it  we  base  our  con 
fident  expectations  for  the  future,  that  we  can  extend 
without  the  heavy  outlays  for  additional  offices  and  for 
laundry  and  other  purposes.  The  matter  is  reduced 
down  to  the  simple  cost  of  building,  heating,  and 
furnishing,  and  these,  as  has  been  demonstrated,  may 
be  brought  to  $500  per  patient  hereafter.  We  dwell 
upon  this  subject,  because,  in  our  judgment,  it  affords 
the  real  solution  of  the  great  question,  what  can  be 
done  with  this  most  helpless  and  unfortunate  class  of 
our  people  ?  We  assume  that  it  is  the  duty  of  the 
State  to  look  after,  protect,  provide  for,  and  secure  this 
class.  They  are  homeless,  friendless,  irresponsible, 


CARE    OF   THE   INSANE.  427 

dangerous,  incapable  of  self-protection,  and  yet  are 
citizens,  part  and  parcel  of  the  body  politic ;  assuredly 
they  are,  and  should  be  wards  of  the  State.  In  the 
establishment  of  this  asylum,  the  State  has  assumed  to 
provide  them  a  home,  and  has  made  provision  for  their 
proper  care.  It  is  quite  evident  that  this  humane 
purpose  would  have  been  greatly  retarded,  if  not  en 
tirely  defeated,  without  devising  less  expensive  build 
ings  than  had  heretofore  been  erected  for  the  care  of 
the  insane.  The  class  to  be  received  here  being 
chronic,  can  be  provided  for  in  cheaper  buildings,  with 
less  expense  than  more  recent  and  excited  cases. 
Keeping  these  ends  in  view,  we  have  proceeded  with 
our  system,  planned  our  buildings,  and  now  propose 
to  extend  on  a  scale  that  will  give  more  room  and 
better  accommodations  for  less  money  than  was  sup 
posed  by  many  to  be  possible. 

"  In  submitting  to  the  legislature  the  result  of  an 
other  year's  observation  and  experience  in  the  man 
agement  of  this  asylum,  we  would  say  we  are  more 
and  more  confirmed  in  our  estimate  of  its  importance 
and  its  peculiar  adaptation  to  its  purpose  and  aims. 
It  was  a  great  problem,  '  How  can  the  chronic  insane 
be  cared  for  ?'  and,  most  of  all,  how  can  this  helpless, 
hopeless  class,  who  are  literally  homeless,  and  to  a  large 
extent  friendless  and  reduced  to  pauperism,  be  pro 
vided  for?  This  question,  involving  so  largely  a  just 
benevolence  and  becoming  humanity,  this  institution  is 
surely  and  wisely  solving.  Necessity  compelled  the 
use  of  the  jail  and  the  poor-houses  ;  but  neither  jail 
nor  poor-house  is  or  can  be  made  fit  or  proper 
places  for  insane  people.  In  them,  in  addition  to  the 


428  CARE    OF   THE  INSANE. 

mental  disturbance,  of  necessity  was  added  physical 
restraint  and  suffering.  The  safety  of  others  de 
manded  chains,  shackles,  and  confinement.  The  want 
of  convenience  forced  the  shameful  herding  together 
of  the  sexes,  when  the  animal  passions  had  survived 
the  loss  of  mental  control.  To  remedy  these  great 
and  crying  evils  this  asylum  was  instituted,  and  for 
four  years  has  been  working  its  great,  humane,  Chris 
tian  purpose.  It  has  unshackled  from  the  limbs  of 
many  of  both  sexes  chains  that  long  had  bound  them. 
It  has  taken  from  damp,  cold,  loathsome  cells  many 
more  who  had  hardly  seen  the  light  of  day  for  years. 
It  has  furnished  to  such,  and  hundreds  of  old,  infirm, 
hopelessly  insane,  and  demented  ones,  a  good,  warm, 
comfortable,  and  safe  home.  To  do  all  this,  it  has  bur 
dened  no  one  to  any  great  extent.  In  addition,  it  has 
demonstrated  that  the  great  problem  is  easy  of  solu 
tion,  and  hence  the  earnestness  with  which  we  urge 
this  subject  so  persistently  upon  your  attention.  We 
certainly  can  so  extend  the  substantial,  cheap  buildings 
here  on  lands  belonging  to  the  State  as  to  relieve 
all  the  poor-houses  of  the  State  from  the  presence  of 
the  insane  now  therein,  or  who  will  be  liable  hereafter 
to  be  sent  there.  Aside  from  the  great  good  to  the 
unfortunate  insane,  this  result  would  greatly  add  to 
the  efficiency  and  comfort  of  the  almshouses  for  their 
legitimate  work.  We  are  assured  that  the  work  of  this 
asylum  has  greatly  improved  many  of  the  almshouses 
from  which  the  insane  have  been  removed.  In  every 
aspect  in  which  the  question  has  been  viewed,  the  de 
mand  comes  with  constant  and  increasing  force  to  go 
on  until  all  the  pauper  insane  are  provided  for  outside 


CARE    OF   THE  INSANE.  429 

of  jails  and  poor-houses;  to  go  on  until  all  of  this 
helpless,  pitiable  class  are  provided  with  safe  and  be 
coming  homes,  here  or  elsewhere,  by  the  State." 

It  has  been  made  perfectly  clear  by  the  facts  we  have 
set  forth,  by  the  authorities  of  the  highest  medical 
character  which  we  have  cited,  by  the  gathered  results 
of  our  own  painful  experience,  and  by  the  like  experi 
ence  of  other  similar  commissions,  that  poor-houses 
are  not  proper  places  for  the  reception,  care,  or  treat 
ment  of  the  insane.  It  is  adverse  not  only  to  the 
interests  of  humanity,  but  to  reason  and  common 
sense.  The  riches  of  benevolence  are  squandered 
thereby,  as  well  as  the  substantial  and  tangible  wealth 
of  the  community.  We  think  that  we  have  demon 
strated  this  problem  clearly  and  accurately  to  every 
unprejudiced,  unselfish,  thinking  mind.  We  submit, 
then,  that  it  is  time  at  least  to  begin  to  close  up  this 
inhuman  and  destructive  system.  We  have  presented 
a  plan  which  will  effect  this  object,  and  which,  we  be 
lieve,  will  in  time  reverse  the  respective  ratios  of  the 
curable  and  incurable  insane  within  our  State.  If  the 
cost  of  maintenance  at  our  State  hospitals  for  the  in 
sane  is  brought  down  to  three  dollars  and  fifteen  cents, 
as  at  the  Willard  Institution,  or  rather  to  three  dollars 
and  fifty  cents,  per  week  per  inmate,  as  at  the  Massa 
chusetts  State  Hospital  at  Northampton,  under  the 
medical  direction  of  Dr.  Pliny  Earle  (a  synopsis  of 
whose  very  definite  and  detailed  account  of  the  system 
and  its  results  is  hereto  appended),  as  we  think  it 
should  be,  and,  as  we  believe,  the  worthy  superintend 
ents  of  our  hospitals  will  succesfully  endeavor  to  make 
it,  the  State  can  afford  to  allow  the  same  ratio  of 


430  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

reduction  on  the  diminished,  as  she  does  upon  the  pres 
ent  cost,  in  the  admissions  of  the  indigent  insane  from 
the  county  authorities ;  which  would  remove  the  only 
existing  obstruction  to  the  reception  of  this  class  into 
the  State  hospitals.  The  cost,  then,  to  the  counties, 
would  not  exceed  two  dollars  and  fifty  cents  per  week 
for  each  patient;  and  no  county  could  fairly  claim  that 
it  was  more  economical  to  keep  her  insane  poor  at 
home.  Even  now,  when  the  interest  upon  property, 
the  cost  of  wear  and  tear,  and  the  proper  proportion 
of  the  expense  of  supervision  are  charged,  the  real 
cost  of  each  inmate  of  the  insane  department  of  an 
almshouse  cannot  be  less  and  is  often  more  than  the 
sum  we  have  suggested  as  the  weekly  charge  by  the 
State  hospitals.  And  when  we  consider  how  insuffi 
cient  in  all  respects  is  the  almshouse  treatment,  and 
how  the  public  mind  demands  and  will  further  demand 
a  higher  standard  and  more  effective  system  of  care 
and  treatment  in  these  county  establishments,  if  they 
continue  to  receive  this  class  of  the  sick  poor,  it  cannot 
be  questioned  that  the  pecuniary  interest  of  the  coun 
ties  will  be  served  by  remitting  entirely  to  the  care  of 
the  State  all  of  their  insane  who  are  not  provided  for 
in  private  hospitals.  And  we  trust  that  the  State  will 
make  provision  to  receive  them,  as  she  should  do,  for 
every  reason  that  humanity  and  even  self-interest  can 
suggest. 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  431 

SYNOPSIS  OF  REPORT  FROM  DR.  PLINY  EARLE,  OF  THE 
MASSACHUSETTS  STATE  HOSPITAL  FOR  THE  INSANE  AT 
NORTHAMPTON. 

Total  cost  of  hospital  to  the  State  was  $373,000,  of 
which  sum  $19,000  was  for  boilers,  alterations  in  heat 
ing,  new  water-tanks,  &c.,  several  years  after  the  hos 
pital  was  opened.  Deducting  this  sum  from  the 
$373,000,  leaves  the  original  cost  to  the  State  as 
$354,000. 

From  the  year  1861  the  entire  appropriations  which 
have  been  made  to  the  hospital  by  the  State  amount 
to  only  $5000,  which  sum  is  included  in  the  $19,000 
previously  mentioned. 

As  an  offset  to  the  $5000,  the  hospital  has  paid  for 
additional  land  to  the  amount  of  $7425.  The  State 
has  thus  been  overpaid  for  its  bonus  the  sum  of  $2425. 

The  amount  paid  by  the  hospital  for  repairs  and  im 
provements  during  the  nine  years,  from  September, 
1865,  to  1874,  is  $95,318.91.  The  cash  assets  now  on 
hand  exceed  the  amount  in  1865  by  $18,526.43.  The 
value  of  purchased  provisions  and  supplies,  including 
fuel  and  stored  clothing  on  hand  and  paid  for,  is  esti 
mated  at  $12,381.98  increase  over  the  amount  on  hand 
in  1865.  The  household  furniture  is  estimated  at  least 
$8000  greater  than  in  1865.  These  various  sums  to 
gether  make  the  total  of  $136,652.32  as  the  amount  of 
debit  of  the  State  to  the  hospital. 

The  necessary  current  repairs  of  the  buildings  are 
estimated  at  $3000,  which,  for  nine  years,  would  make 
$27,000;  deducting  this  sum  from  the  $136,652.32, 
there  is  a  remainder  of  $109,652.32  as  being  the 


43 2  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

amount  which  the  hospital  has  itself  expended  for 
necessaries,  which  are  usually  paid  for  by  direct  ap 
propriation  from  the  public  treasury. 

These  expenditures  have  been  made  from  revenue 
derived  from  patients.  We  will  take,  for  example,  one 
year,  as  follows: — The  weekly  average  number  of 
patients  for  the  year  ending  September  3Oth,  1874, 
was,  of  State  paupers,  284T4oir;  town  paupers,  iO2T8Q-8o-; 
private  patients,  82Tfo;  total,  4693%.  Their  cost  of 
maintenance  was,  for  State  paupers,  three  dollars  and 
fifty  cents  per  week  for  full  support,  including  clothing; 
for  town  paupers,  three  dollars  and  fifty  cents  per 
week,  exclusive  of  clothing  ;  for  private  patients,  at 
various  prices,  none  over  ten  dollars  per  week,  and 
averaging  only  five  dollars  and  forty-three  cents  per 
week  for  each.  Such  were  the  sources  of  income  for 
the  year.  The  expenditures  for  the  same  period  were 
as  follows: — Expenses  of  repairs  and  improvements, 
$10,720.13;  increase  of  cash  assets  during  the  year, 
$1,182.01 ;  increase  of  purchased  and  paid  for  supplies, 
$2,224.66;  an  orchard  of  about  fifteen  acres  of  land, 
$4000.  Total  of  self-betterments  of  the  hospital  dur 
ing  the  year,  $18,126.80. 


CONCLUDING   CHAPTER. 

THE  COMMONWEALTH  OF  PENNSYLVANIA  ADOPTS  THE  PRIN 
CIPLE  OF  PROVIDING  HOSPITAL  ACCOMMODATIONS  FOR 
ALL  HER  INSANE  POOR,  RECOGNIZING  THEM  AS  THE 
WARDS  OF  THE  STATE. 

THIS  was  one  of  my  earliest  thoughts  and  wishes  in 
regard  to  the  care  of  the  insane ;  and  the  most  per 
sistent  efforts  of  the  administration  of  the  Board  of 
Public  Charities  were  made  to  secure  its  adoption  and 
execution. 

As  a  preliminary  step  in  this  direction,  the  following 
action  was  taken  by  the  board  in  relation  to  the  insane 
department  of  the  Philadelphia  almshouse,  as  reported 
in  1870  to  the  legislature:— 

At  a  stated  meeting  of  the  Board  of  Public  Charities, 
held  at  the  capital  on  June  ist,  1870,  Mr.  Harrison 
offered  the  following  preamble  and  resolution,  which 
were  unanimously  adopted  :— 

WHEREAS,  The  insufficient  and  unsuitable  accommo 
dations  for  the  inmates  of  the  department  for  the 
insane  of  the  Philadelphia  almshouse,  render  it  impos 
sible  not  only  to  employ  proper  remedial  measures  for 
their  recovery,  but  even  to  secure  their  personal  com 
fort  and  safety ;  therefore, 

Resolved,  That  this  board  respectfully  request  the 
Guardians  of  the  Poor  of  Philadelphia  County  to  take 
early  action  on  this  subject,  and  to  adopt  and  persevere 
in  the  most  effective  measures  to  have  these  accommo 
dations  enlarged  and  improved. 

(433) 


434  CARE    OF  THE   INSANE. 

Mr.  Clymer  offered  the  following  resolution,  which 
was  adopted  :— 

Resolved,  That  the  committee  of  this  board  for  the 
district,  in  conjunction  with  the  general  agent,  be  in 
structed  to  present  the  above  preamble  and  resolution 
to  the  proper  authorities,  both  of  the  almshouse  and 
the  city  of  Philadelphia,  and  to  express  the  views  of  the 
Board  of  Public  Charities  on  this  subject. 

STATED  MEETING,  SEPTEMBER  7™,  1870. 

Mr.  Harrison,  on  behalf  of  the  committee  on  the 
Philadelphia  almshouse,  made  a  report  and  read  ex 
tracts  from  several  newspapers,  expressing  their  appro 
bation  of  the  action  of  the  Board  of  Public  Charities 
in  reference  to  the  Philadelphia  almshouse. 

REPORT. 

The  committee  appointed  to  communicate  with  the 
proper  authorities  in  reference  to  the  crowded  condi 
tion  of  the  insane  department  of  the  Philadelphia 
almshouse,  respectfully  report — 

That  shortly  after  the  adjournment  of  the  board,  we 
presented  the  resolutions  of  the  board  on  this  subject 
to  the  Guardians  of  the  Poor  and  the  Councils  of  the 
City  of  Philadelphia,  accompanied  by  a  communication 
to  Councils,  hereto  annexed,  intended  to  impress  them 
with  the  urgent  necessity  of  affording  immediate  relief 
to  the  inmates  of  the  above  institution ;  that  these 
papers  having  been  appropriately  referred,  conferences 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  435 

were  held  with  the  committees,  and  other  members  of 
Councils  ;  that  a  plan  was  devised  to  extend  the  accom 
modations  for  the  insane,  in  the  simplest  and  least  ex 
pensive  way  that  would  secure  proper  wards  for 
remedial  treatment ;  that  the  information  obtained  was 
imparted  to  Councils,  with  a  request  for  an  application 
of  $70,000,  the  sum  needed  to  accomplish  the  work, 
which  was  granted  by  both  branches,  by  a  unanimous 
vote.  Full  plans  and  specifications  have  been  prepared, 
after  consultation  with  expert  physicians,  and  a  con 
tract  awarded,  and  preparation  made  for  beginning  the 
work. 

The  following  communication  was  addressed  to  the 
Select  and  Common  Councils  of  the  City  of  Philadel 
phia: — 

GENTLEMEN  : — The  undersigned,  who  have  been  in 
trusted  with  the  duty  of  presenting  to  the  authorities 
of  the  city  of  Philadelphia  the  accompanying  preamble 
and  resolutions  of  the  Board  of  Public  Charities,  re 
spectfully  beg  leave  to  state  that  we  have  endeavored 
to  make  ourselves  thoroughly  familiar  with  the  condi 
tion  of  the  insane  department  of  the  Philadelphia 
almshouse ;  and  that  we  have  done  so,  after  large 
observation  of  similar  institutions  in  various  parts  of 
the  State.  That  while  we  observe,  with  unqualified 
satisfaction,  that  this  institution  is  under  the  superin 
tendence  of  an  able  and  faithful  physician, — an  advan 
tage  too  seldom  enjoyed  by  county  asylums, — we  are 
constrained  to  recognize  the  painful  fact  that  the  con 
tracted  accommodations  for  so  large  a  population,  and 
the  almost  entire  absence  of  needful  resources  for  the 
application  of  scientific  remedies,  render  a  physician's 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

skill  almost  useless,  unless  to  repair  the  bodily  harm 
which  the  inmates  suffer,  either  from  self-infliction  or 
the  violence  of  their  companions,  excited  to  frenzy  by 
a  mutually  reacting  irritation,  which  is  the  outgrowth 
alone  of  their  crowded  and  unclassified  condition.  We 
are  well  aware  that  this  communication  would  be  an 
appropriate  one  to  the  board  of  guardians,  and  we 
should  not  fulfill  our  duty  without  urging  upon  them 
the  necessity  of  instant  attention  to  the  subject ;  but,  as 
legislation  by  yourselves  is  needed  to  enable  that  board 
to  reach  any  practical  result,  we  address  you,  also,  as 
the  more  important  authority  in  the  premises. 

We  might  easily  set  forth  to  you  the  clear  right  of 
this  dependent  and  afflicted  class  of  our  citizens,  not 
only  on  the  ground  of  humanity,  but  of  law  and  justice, 
to  liberal  care  and  guardianship  from  the  city  of  Phila 
delphia.  We  might  expose  in  detail  their  condition  of 
constant  retrogression,  instead  of  advance,  in  mental 
and  physical  health ;  we  might  give  our  views  as  to 
what  extension  is  needed  to  secure  effectually  the  per 
sonal  safety  of  the  inmates,  or,  what  is  better,  so  to 
classify  them  as  to  give  them  the  advantages  of  hos 
pital  treatment ;  but  we  forbear  to  occupy  your  atten 
tion  at  this  time,  further  than  to  say,  in  behalf  of  the 
Board  of  Public  Charities,  that  we  should  deprecate 
any  reliance  upon  the  prospective  relief  to  this  depart 
ment  of  the  almshouse,  which  may  be  anticipated  from 
the  establishment  of  a  house  of  correction  ;*  but  that, 
with  our  present  convictions,  we  have  confidence  only 

*  The  thought  was  encouraged  by  some  of  the  officials  of  the  city  government, 
that  the  contemplated  house  of  correction  would  so  relieve  the  almshouse  as  to 
afford  the  needed  room  for  the  insane  inmates. 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  437 

in  the  prompt  enlargement  of  the  department  for  the 
insane,  upon  the  premises  where  it  is  now  located. 

GEO.  L.  HARRISON, 
HIESTER  CLYMER, 

Committee. 

WlLMER    WORTHINGTON, 

Secretary  and  General  Agent. 

STATED  MEETING,  DECEMBER  7™,  1870. 

Mr.  Harrison  reported  further  proceedings  in  refer 
ence  to  the  insane  department  of  the  Philadelphia 
almshouse. 

The  following  communication  was  addressed  to  the 
Councils  of  Philadelphia  on  October  jist: — 

GENTLEMEN  : — The  undersigned,  members  of  the 
Board  of  Public  Charities,  who  have  especial  super 
vision  of  the  institutions  in  that  district  of  the  State 
in  which  Philadelphia  is  located,  beg  leave  to  make  the 
following  statement  to  your  honorable  bodies : — We 
look  back  with  the  most  grateful  feelings  at  your  recent 
action  in  behalf  of  the  insane  department  of  the  alms- 
house,  and  anticipate  with  confident  hope  that  the 
condition  of  its  inmates  will  be  benefited  to  their  own 
great  improvement  and  the  consequent  credit  and 
economic  advantage  of  the  city  ;  but  in  order  to  realize 
full  success,  we  earnestly  ask  your  attention  to  a  few 
points  bearing  most  influentially  upon  the  manage 
ment  of  that  institution.  We  take  it  for  granted  that 
suitable  provision  will  be  made  for  heating,  lighting, 
ventilating,  &c.  the  projected  extension,  which  will  be 


43$  CARE    OF   THE   INSANE. 

moderate  in  cost,  but  which  should  be  obviously 
arranged  for  now,  to  prevent  damage  to  the  buildings 
and  to  save  expense  from  its  introduction  after  they 
are  completed. 

Another  important  consideration  is  the  compensa 
tion  of  the  medical  superintendent,  and  the  character 
and  qualifications  of  his  assistants.  It  is  entirely  un 
deniable  that  a  servant,  conscious  of  unfair  treatment, 
whether  as  to  recompense  or  otherwise,  is  unable  to 
meet  fully  the  requisitions  of  his  service,  whatever  may 
be  the  degree  of  his  conscientiousness  ;  and,  for  this 
reason,  we  fear  that,  should  it  become  certain  that  the 
present  appropriation  for  salary  of  that  officer  at  our 
almshouse  will  not  be  considerably  increased,  the  deep 
interest  which  is  now  manifested  must  necessarily  de 
cline  ;  and  it  is  quite  sure  that  no  suitable  successor 
can  be  engaged  on  such  terms.  We  feel  confident 
that  the  physician  of  seven  hundred  and  fifty  insane  in 
mates,  with  a  salary  of  $1350  a  year  and  perquisites  of 
residence  and  vegetables,  which  would  not  increase  this 
sum  by  $ 1 50,  cannot,  however  devoted  to  his  work, 
enjoy  that  satisfaction  and  that  freedom  from  care  for 
his  domestic  interests,  which  are  essential  to  his  full 
efficiency.  We  hope,  therefore,  that  in  the  interests  of 
the  institution  and  the  public,  as  also  in  justice  to  who 
ever  may  be  the  incumbent  of  that  office,  a  more 
reasonable  salary  will  be  appropriated.  We  beg,  in 
this  relation,  to  adduce  a  few  examples  of  the  salaries 
paid  to  the  physicians  of  similar  institutions.  At 
Colney  Hatch,  England,  John  Welsh  writes  that  the 
"  physicians  receive  equal  to  $3000  in  gold,  with  house, 
fuel,  light,  butter,  milk,  and  vegetables." 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  439 

At  the  New  York  State  Lunatic  Asylum,  with  six 
hundred  inmates,  the  appropriations  for  1869  were 
"  $10,000  for  officers;"  for  "attendants,  engineer, 
apothecary,  butcher,  tailor,  farmer,  bookkeeper,  clerk, 
&c->  $375983.49."  The  physician  has  three  assistants. 
At  the  hospital  for  the  insane  at  Flatbush,  Long  Island, 
the  salary  is  $2000,  with  residence  and  full  support, 
including  the  convenience  of  a  horse  and  carriage. 
The  number  of  inmates  there  is  six  hundred.  There 
are  two  assistants  at  $800  each.  At  the  institution  on 
Blackwell's  Island,  New  York  City,  the  salary  is  $2500, 
with  dwelling  apartments  commodious  and  convenient, 
and  partial  subsistence.  There  are  three  assistants,  the 
salary  of  the  first  being  $1000.  In  our  own  State,  Dr. 
Reed,  of  Dixmont,  near  Pittsburg,  receives  $3000,  with 
dwelling  and  subsistence.  He  has  four  hundred 
patients,  with,  at  present  one  assistant  at  $900  salary, 
another  being  promised.  Dr.  Curwen,  of  the  Harris- 
burg  institution,  receives  $2500,  with  two  assistants 
at  $800  each ;  also,  commodious  apartments  in  the 
institution,  subsistence,  and  other  liberal  provision. 
Number  of  inmates,  four  hundred.  We  are  not  aware 
of  any  similar  institution  of  any  magnitude  where  the 
compensation  is  so  inadequate  as  at  our  own,  and 
where  there  is  no  paid  assistant.  We  therefore  re 
spectfully  suggest  that  the  salary  of  the  medical  super 
intendent  of  the  insane  department  of  the  almshouse 
be  increased ;  that  a  suitable  dwelling-place  for  his 
family  be  provided,  and  that  he  be  furnished  with  at 
least  one  paid  assistant ;  for  we  must  not  fail  to  bear 
in  mind  that  an  insane  asylum  is  not  merely  a  place  of 
detention,  requiring  only  men  of  bone  and  muscle  as 


440  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

"  keepers,"  but  a  hospital,  where  scientific  and  experi 
enced  skill  is  required,  with  anxious  care  by  night  as 
well  as  day,  for  remedial  treatment.  In  this  connection 
we  would  also  suggest  that  a  moderate  appropriation 
be  made  for  the  employment  of  paid  attendants,  the 
paupers  who  are  detailed  for  this  work  being  wholly 
unfit,  and  generally,  from  want  of  feeling  and  want  of 
principle,  practising  cruelty  or  neglect,  subversive  of 
the  first  essentials  towards  relief  or  cure  of  this  peculiar 
malady.  With  these  improvements  in  the  affairs  of 
the  almshouse  asylum  of  this  city,  we  are  confident  that, 
when  the  extension  is  completed,  so  evident  an  ameli 
oration  of  the  condition  of  that  afflicted  class  of  our 
citizens  will  be  apparent,  and  so  evident  an  advantage 
to  the  community  from  the  speedy  restoration  of  many 
of  the  inmates,  as  will  lead  us  all  to  rejoice  in  the 
benevolent  liberality  which  Councils  have  manifested  in 
their  behalf. 

GEO.  L.  HARRISON, 
HIESTER  CLYMER, 

Committee. 

WlLMER    WORTHINGTON, 

Secretary  and  General  Agent. 

This  communication  was  referred  to  the  Finance 
Committee  of  Councils,  who  reported  favorably  on  its 
recommendations,  and,  thereupon,  Councils  made  the 
requisite  appropriations  to  carry  them  out. 

Thus  was  taken  up  the  best,  and  at  the  same  time 
the  most  conspicuous  example  of  an  insane  depart 
ment  in  an  almshouse  with  medical  superintendence, 
but  without  suitable  hospital  accommodations  for  either 


CARE    OF  THE  INSANE.  441 

sex.  The  appeal  prepared  by  me,  as  chairman  of  the 
committee  on  this  subject,  was  recognized  by  Councils, 
the  grant  was  made  without  dissent ;  and  extensions  of 
the  male  and  female  departments  were  built  as  sug-  ' 
gested.  For  the  first  time,  up  to  this  date,  was  full 
opportunity  given,  in  a  county  almshouse,  to  the  im 
poverished  and  helpless  insane  to  enjoy  the  benefits 
which  are  derived  from  hospital  accommodations,  and 
hospital  care  and  supervision. 

Subsequently,  in  accordance  with  the  further  sug 
gestions  made  in  a  second  appeal  to  the  Councils  of 
Philadelphia,  the  medical  superintendent  was  more 
adequately  compensated,  a  paid  assistant  was  given 
him,  better  nourishment  was  allowed  to  the  patients, 
and  the  plan  of  "working  the  department  in  the 
cheapest  way  " — not  the  most  economical — was  aban 
doned.  The  efforts  in  this  first  movement  were  thus 
crowned  with  success ;  and  while  communicating  with 
many  members  of  Councils  in  relation  to  the  matter, 
the  expectation  was  announced  that  the  State  herself 
would  at  length  assume  the  obligation  and  adopt  the 
policy  of  providing  hospital  care  and  maintenance  for 
the  insane  poor  of  Philadelphia,  as  well  as  of  the  rest 
of  the  Commonwealth ;  thus  making  her  policy,  in  this 
regard,  uniform  and  universal.  The  belief  further 
was  expressed  that  she  would  be  prepared  for  the 
recognition  of  this  humane  and  generous  duty  within 
the  period  of  five  years ;  and,  for  this  end,  incessant 
efforts  were  put  forth  to  inform  the  intelligence  and 
stir  up  the  humanity  of  leading  citizens  to  aid  and 
sustain  the  board  in  the  accomplishment  of  this  great 
and  cherished  object. 


442  CARE    OF  THE  INSANE. 

The  day  after  my  report  to  the  board  in  the  Phila 
delphia  case,  recited  above,  the  following  record  is 
made  of  its  proceedings  : — 

MEETING  HELD  AT  HARRISBURG,  DECEMBER  STH,  1870. 

Mr.  Harrison  offered  the  following  resolutions,  which 
were  adopted : — 

Resolved,  That  the  Board  of  Public  Charities,  having 
witnessed  the  evils  which  result  from  the  connection  of 
insane  asylums  with  almshouses,  and  believing  that  a 
wrong  is  done  to  the  insane  by  classing  them  with 
paupers,  hindering  the  public  from  estimating  aright 
their  claims  to  sympathy  and  remedial  treatment,  dis 
approve  of  such  an  alliance,  and  believe  that  the  best 
interests  of  this  afflicted  class  of  her  people,  and  the 
duty  of  the  State,  concur  in  the  establishment  by  the 
State,  within  a  reasonable  time,  of  sufficient  accommo 
dations  for  the  maintenance  and  treatment  of  all  the 
insane  who  may  not  be  cared  for  in  private  hospitals. 

Resolved,  That,  in  the  judgment  of  the  board,  all 
superintendents  of  hospitals  for  the  insane  should  be 
members  of  the  medical  profession. 

The  effort  thus  inaugurated  in  1870  being  earn 
estly  followed  up  from  year  to  year, — as  the  preceding 
pages  will  show, — resulted,  in  the  winter  of  1875,  in 
my  framing  a  bill  for  carrying  into  effect  the  desired 
object.  Being  unable  to  remain  in  Harrisburg  during 
that  session  of  the  legislature,  the  measure,  though 
reported  to  that  body,  was  not  pressed  for  enactment  ; 
but  the  legislature  of  1876  passed  the  bill,  providing 


CARE    OF  THE   INSANE.  443 

for  the  purchase  of  two  hundred  acres  of  ground  and 
the  erection  thereon  of  a  State  hospital  for  the  accom 
modation  of  the  insane  poor  of  Philadelphia  and  some 
contiguous  counties. 

Though  deeply  regretting  that  the  pressure  of  other 
engagements  prevented  me  from  accepting  the  place 
of  chairman  of  the  commission  for  carrying  this  act 
into  effect, — to  which  I  was  appointed  by  the  Governor 
of  the  State, — I  close  this  little  volume  with  the  expres 
sion  of  my  hearty  joy  and  thanksgiving  that  the  erec 
tion  of  this  hospital,  with  the  completion  of  others 
now  being  built,  will  enable  the  State  to  perform  her 
recognized  duty  of  supplying  hospital  accommodations 
for  all  the  insane  poor  within  her  bounds  ;  so  that 
none  need  hereafter  be  left  in  prisons  or  in  alms- 
houses.  The  Harrisburg  hospital  will  provide  for  the 
central  portions  of  the  State;  the  hospital  at  Dixmont 
for  the  south-western  part ;  that  at  Warren,  when  com 
pleted  according  to  its  plans,  will  amply  suffice,  for 
many  years  to  come,  for  the  north-west ;  the  hospital 
at  Danville,  when  finished  in  like  manner,  will  furnish 
abundant  accommodation  for  the  north-eastern  por 
tion  ;  and,  finally,  the  South-eastern  Hospital,  for  the 
building  of  which  the  whole  sum  needed  has  been 
appropriated  by  the  legislature,  will  be  made  to  pro 
vide  for  Philadelphia  and  the  adjoining  counties, 
namely,  for  that  district  of  the  State  which  is  desig 
nated  by  its  title. 

Thus  will  a  great  sum  of  money  have  been  ex 
pended;  but  thus,  also,  will  one  of  the  most  imperative 
duties  of  the  Commonwealth  have  been  fulfilled. 


LIBRAE! 

UNIVERSITY  OF 

CALIFORNIA. 


INDEX. 


Absentees  from  public  schools,  16. 

Act  of  1 86 1,  repeal  suggested,  378. 

Ancient  torture  of  prisoners,  90;  abolition  of  vindictive  punishments,  112. 

Aberdeen,  Scotland,  juvenile  delinquents  in,  83. 

Apathy  of  the  public  respecting  insane  poor,  280. 

Agricultural  pursuits  a  cause  of  insanity,  401. 

Annual  cost  of  criminals,  86. 

Almshouses — Not  proper  insane  hospitals,  266,  274 ;  cases  of  cruelty  to  insane  in, 

385,  390- 

Board  of  Public  Charities,  107  ;  aims  of,  Ii8;  reports  of,  266. 
Benevolence  in  punishment  and  in  provision  for  the  poor,  100-104. 
Brewster,  Hon.  F.  Carroll,  on  Pennsylvania  laws  on  insane,  330. 

Capital  punishment,  116. 

Carpenter,  Miss  Mary,  letter  from,  52,  55. 

Cities,  neglected  children  in,  i,  5;  criminal  classes,  209;  relations  to  state, 
1 8,  70. 

Charitable  institutions,  State  aid  to  private,  43,  47,  48. 

Christianity  and  civilization,  influence  on  convicts,  89,  149. 

Causes  of  insanity — Agricultural  pursuits,  401;  physical  and  hereditary,  405. 

Children — Neglected,  pauper,  and  vicious,  4,  5,  16,76,88;  State  aid  to,  49; 
industrial  schools  in  England,  50,  53;  employed  in  factories,  17,  19;  out 
side  the  range  of  common  schools,  46 ;  vagrant,  37,  44. 

Classification  of  prisoners,  165,  173;  in  England,  168. 

Commitment  of  insane,  253;  legislation  needed,  255. 

Constitutional  Convention  of  Pennsylvania — Retrogressive  action  of,  42;  me 
morial  to,  56,  75. 

Commutation  of  sentences  on  reformation,  178,  187. 

Compulsory  education,  1,36;  in  other  countries,  8,  12,31;  in  various  States, 
13,15;  recent  legislation,  31,  36;  cost  of,  22;  objections  to  considered,  20; 
not  prejudicial  to  liberty  of  conscience,  25 ;  general  law  proposed,  30;  New 
England  law  of  1642,  31. 

Compensation  of  medical  superintendents,  adequate,  441. 

(445) 


446  INDEX. 

Convicts — Annual  cost  of,  55,  86;  reformation  of,  92;  discharged,  191;  instruc 
tion  to,  147,  157  ;  kind  treatment  of,  158,  165  ;  proper  classification  of,  165, 
173;  not  discharged  unreformed,  153;  statistics  of  Pennsylvania,  242; 
labor  of,  124,  147. 

Criminals — Illiterate,  78;  number  of,  241;  reform  of,  119;  public  apathy 
respecting,  225  ;  suggestions,  209. 

Criminal  insane,  286,  288,  379;  Pennsylvania  laws,  303,  311,  330;  act  of  1861, 
311;  memorial  to  legislature  in  behalf  of,  318,  325,  345;  legislation  in 
various  States,  335,  345  ;  opinion  of  convention  of  medical  superintendents, 
347,  358 ;  provision  for,  367  ;  no  punitive  treatment,  367  ;  suggestions,  345, 

374- 

Crime  allied  to  ignorance,  37  ;    prevention  of,   105;  prison  economy,  105,  119. 
Contractors  for  convict  labor,  138. 
Curable   insane,  268,  403;  large  percentage  of,    259,  415,  419;  importance  of 

early  and  proper  treatment,  415,  419;  cure  retarded  in  poor-houses,  415. 
Crofton,  Sir  William — Graded  prisons,  164,  231. 
Common  schools  need  some  supplement,  59. 

Dangerous  classes,  182,  232. 

Duty  of  the  State  to  neglected  children,  7 ;  in  general  education,  41  ;  to  insane 
poor,  272  378;  to  insane  criminals,  290. 

Destitute  and  neglected  children,  37,  44. 

Dietary  arrangements  in  prisons,  98. 

Discharge  of  convicts  on  reformation,  178;  discharging-houses,  187-190;  pro 
vision  for,  191-196,  216;  discharge  of  untried  prisoners,  206;  statistics,  206. 

Dix,  Miss — Efforts  in  behalf  of  insane  poor,  273,  282. 

Economy — Public,  in  State  provision  for  neglected  children,  55,  78,  86;  for  in 
sane,  259,  270,  406. 

Education — Compulsory,  1-37;  moral  and  religious,  IO,  25. 
Europe — Results  of  prison  reform,  239;  English  industrial  schools,  54. 
Escaped  prisoners,  189. 
Earle,  Dr.  Pliny-r-Report  of,  431. 
Early  efforts  of  Board  of  Public  Charities,  for  insane,  433. 

Family — The  type  of  the  State,  101 ;  of  the  convict  should  share  products  of  his 

labor,  216,  235. 
Female  convicts,  123,  212. 

Gradation — Of  prisons,  231 ;  of  penalties,  115,  182. 
"Godless  schools"  an  unjust  epithet,  21,  26. 

Habeas  corpus  peculiar  to  England  and  United  States,  92. 

Humane  treatment — Of  convicts,  92,  106,  112,   119,   158-165,  229;    of  insane 

criminals,  290. 
Hospitals  for  insane  in  Pennsylvania,  370,  409,  422,  443. 


INDEX.  447 

Ignorance  and  crime  inseparable,  6. 

Illiterates — In  United  States,  2  ;  Pennsylvania,  3,  57  ;  Philadelphia,  81  ;  Southern 
States,  78;  New  York,  79;  criminals,  37;  children,  43;  paupers,  39. 

Insanity — A  disease,  not  a  crime,  405;  character  of,  247,  261 ;  causes  of,  401, 
405,  442. 

Insane — Care  of  the,  248 ;  in  poor-houses,  243,  247 ;  in  ancient  Greece  and 
Egypt,  251;  experienced  attendants  for,  252;  number  of,  263;  dan 
gerous,  mischievous,  dependent,  264,  322;  harmless,  322;  memorials 
respecting,  to  Board  of  Public  Charities,  326 ;  should  not  be  in  prisons  or 
poor-houses,  370;  a  plea  for  the  insane,  261,381;  poor  in  Pennsylvania 
hospitals  and  poor-houses,  398 ;  probable  number  of  new  cases,  410 ;  sta 
tistics,  411,418;  chronic  poor,  427;  suggestions  for  enlarged  provision  for, 
422,  433- 

Insane  criminals — In  prisons,  267,  286,  288  ;  in  State  penitentiaries,  294, 295,  346 ; 
291,  303,  311,  318,  324;  legislation  in  various  States,  335,  345,  347,358; 
plan  of  a  hospital  ward  for,  360,  366,  374>  3?8. 

Insane  poor,  263  ;  in  Pennsylvania,  270 ;  cruel  treatment  of,  in  New  York,  273  ; 
shocking  cases  in  Pennsylvania  poor-houses,  274,  279,  385,  390,  394;  prac 
tically  excluded  from  State  hospitals,  281;  remarks,  385,  393,  396;  insuffi 
cient  provision  for,  in  Pennsylvania,  243,  433-443. 

Insane  curable,  259,  268,  403,  415. 

Insane  incurable,  257,  282,  380,  398. 

Industrial  schdols  in  London,  50,  53;   in  Scotland,  83. 

Intermediate  prisons  or  discharging-houses,  187,  190. 

Innocent  persons  charged  with  crime,  204. 

Imprisonment  for  life,  198. 

Intemperance  a  cause  of  crime,  183. 

International  Prison  Reform  Congress,  47,  162,  224,  233,  239. 

Juvenile  vagrants  and  criminals,  85,  87. 

Jarvis,  Dr.  Edward — Remarks  on  effects  of  education,  40. 

Legislation  in  Pennsylvania  for  the  insane,  330,  334;  in  other  States,  335,  345. 
Labor  of    convicts — Salutary  effects,  95,  124,  147,  209;    profits  of,  139;  effects 

on  free  labor,  141 ;  proper  application  of  proceeds,  139,  235. 
Livingston,  Edward,  on  prison  discipline,  131,  134,  167. 

"Mark  system"  of  rewarding  prisoners,  164,  172,  184,  230. 

Municipal  prisons,  200. 

Moral  effects  of  education,  24,  123. 

Massachusetts — Compulsory  education  in,  3,  5,  14;  insane  in,  328,  431. 

Memorial — Of  Board  of  Public  Charities  to  Constitutional  Convention  on  State 
aid  to  charities,  56 ;  to  Pennsylvania  Legislature  in  behalf  of  insane  crimi 
nals,  318;  of  physicians  and  citizens  in  behalf  of  insane,  371,  374. 

Medical  superintendents  of  insane  hospitals  on  criminal  insane — correspond 
ence,  347,  353 ;  resolutions,  353,  358 ;  statements  and  review,  354,  360 ; 
compensation  of,  438. 


INDEX. 

Neglected,  destitute,  and  vicious  children,  I,  17,  54,  58,  76,  88. 
New  York  provides  for  total  insane  population,  258,  260. 

Officials — Incompetent  prison,  5.24236 

Pennsylvania — Illiterates  in,  3,  5,  57;  insane  in,  407  ;  legislation  for  insane  re 
trogressive,  42,  43,  77 ;  criminal  lunatics,  303,310,  345;  prison  reform  in, 
118;  poor  insane,  281,  378,  385,  433-443;  total  amount  of  State  aid  to 
local  charities  from  1752  to  1872  (130  years),  67. 

Paying  patients  in  State  hospitals  exclude  the  poor  insane,  283,  285,  368,  382, 
391  ;  private  asylums  for  the  wealthy,  265. 

Paupers,  39,  50,  103. 

Prevention  of  crime,  77,  78,   105. 

Pardoning  power,  the,  196. 

Public  schools  in  Pennsylvania,  3,  21,  45. 

Penitentiaries — -Convict  labor,  143  ;  insane  in,  295,  323. 

Prison  discipline  and  economy,  89,  242;  solitaiy  confinement,  94;  labor,  95; 
recent  progress  in  Europe,  222 ;  general  summary  and  suggestions,  214,  222. 

Prison-keepers  and  officials,  93,  138;  selection  and  training  of,  173,  178,  185, 
202,  227,  236;  sheriffs  incompetent  as,  175. 

Philadelphia  Hospital,  insane  department — Enlargement  of,  435. 

Read  and  write — Number  unable  to,  28,  57,  79. 

Refuges  and  other  provisions  for  discharged  prisoners,  191,  196. 

Reformatory  use  of  imprisonment,  92,  119,  124,  220,  238;  reform  schools,  74,  76, 

00 

OO. 

Religious  instruction  in  prisons,  97,   157. 

State  aid  to  public  charities,  49,  56,  75. 
Solitary  confinement,  94,  127,  129,  166,  170,  209. 
Sumptuary  laws,  117. 
Short  terms  of  imprisonment,   183. 
Station-houses,  200. 

Truancy — Suppression  of,  in  Boston,  13. 

Turner,  Rev.  Sydney,  on  reformatory  and  industrial  schools,  74. 

Untried  prisoners — Large  number  of  discharged,  204,  206. 
Undetermined  sentences,  153. 

Value  of  education  to  the  State,  29,  40. 
Vagrants,  210;  children,  44,  52. 
Vindictive  punishments,  109;  Draconian  laws,   no. 
Voluntary  labor  of  convicts,   134. 

Willarcl  Asylum  for  Insane,  New  York,  260,  269,  423,  439. 
Wines,  Dr.  E.  C.,  on  reformatory  efforts,  50,  96,  238. 
Witnesses — Provision  for  persons  detained  as,  203,  210. 
Women  as  prison  visitors,  237. 


, 


14  DAY  USE 

RETURN  TO  DESK  FROM  WHICH  BORROWED 

LOAN  DEPT. 

This  book  is  due  on  the  last  date  stamped  below,  or 

on  the  date  to  which  renewed. 
Renewed  books  are  subject  to  immediate  recall. 


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